Teamwork Motorsport showed true grit and determination as its baptism of fire continued in the latest instalment – Round 3 – of the 2014 SINOPEC LUBRICANTS China Touring Car Championship (CTCC) on the Shanghai International Circuit (24-25 May).
Shanghai was deemed to be Teamwork Motorsport’s first opportunity to unlock its true potential in what has been a tough CTCC initiation affected by technical problems and extreme weather.
The Guangdong-based outfit had an encouraging start to proceedings on China’s premier racetrack, the Shanghai International Circuit (SIC).
On his maiden visit to the Formula 1 Chinese Grand Prix venue, Hong Kong’s Alex Hui stunned himself and the opposition by getting to within a second of the leading Ford contenders in Thursday’s free practice sessions and was hopeful of reducing the deficit further as the weekend progressed.
Unfortunately, Teamwork Motorsport’s fortunes took a turn for the worse, as both of its new-for-2014 Citroen C Elysees developed overheating issues that would blight the remainder of its Shanghai programme.
The team’s running was severely curtailed and it was denied the chance of optimising the setups of its Citroen C Elysees when the persisting overheating issues prevented from partaking in the remaining free practice sessions, as well as qualifying.
A thorough repair job, where most of the engine parts were replaced, saw Teamwork Motorsport return to the fray in Sunday’s morning warm-up (25 May).
Having clocked up very few miles and completed little setup work, the team took a completely new direction with its configuration and opted to use the race as an extended test session, hoping to make up some lost ground.
A clutch issue caused Hui to stall at the start, but teammate Sunny Wong had a strong launch and ran at a competitive pace to scythe from ninth to fifth, before succumbing to the recurring overheating problems.
Having got going, Hui was struck by oil pressure and throttle issues, but stubbornly nursed his ailing car to the finish in eighth place, concluding a trying weekend for the team that will be filed as yet another hard lesson in its CTCC baptism.
Hui said: The team was full of optimism on Thursday, as we started on such a positive note and made a great deal of progress. I was surprised by my own pace, this being my first ever outing on the Shanghai International Circuit, although I trust the team’s ability and know it’s more than capable of producing a race and championship-winning car.
“Then disaster came! Both cars suffered overheating problems and we missed valuable practice time and qualifying, which put us on the back foot for the rest of the weekend and forced us to treat it as an extended test session. Other, more minor problems hampered the racing and I just ran at the back, clocking up as much mileage as I could with a 20kph straight-line speed deficit. Without these problems, which are an inevitable part of running a brand new car, I’m sure Teamwork Motorsport would have been very competitive.”
Round 4 of the 2014 SINOPEC LUBRICANTS China Touring Car Championship (CTCC) is scheduled to take place on the Shanghai TianMa Circuit in two weeks’ time (7-8 June).