Autosportfoto

Stories of the first WTCR year: royalty on track

Royalty took to the track when the WTCR – FIA World Touring Car Cup presented by OSCARO visited The Netherlands for the fourth event of the season.

Prince Bernhard van Oranje, a member of the Dutch royal family and an experienced racer in his own right, started and finished all three races at Circuit Zandvoort, the track he owns.

Driving an Audi RS 3 LMS for Bas Koeten Racing, the 48-year-old van Oranje placed P21 in Race 1 and Race 2 before coming home P19 in the third and final race of the Jumbo Racedagen weekend, which attracted 110,000 fans – and Red Bull’s Dutch Formula One star Max Verstappen.

“It was one of the best weekends we ever had and all the spectators enjoyed it,” said van Oranje, who was competing as a wildcard entrant. “For a driver new to the series not very experienced in front-wheel drive it was a tough, but at the end my times were in the top 10 although that was Race 3.”

While Dutch fans took great delight in celebrating Verstappen’s appearance, spectators from France had the biggest reason to cheer with Yann Ehrlacher, Aurélien Comte and Jean-Karl Vernay sharing the wins powered by Honda, PEUGEOT and Audi respectively.

Zdroj: fiawtcr.com