There is great regret at Lamborghini upon returning from Interlagos, where the 6h of Sao Paulo had a negative outcome after things seemed to be going well for the House of the Raging Bull.
During the fifth seasonal event of the FIA World Endurance Championship, the SC63 driven by Daniil Kvyat, Edoardo Mortara and Mirko Bortolotti started from 18th place on the grid, suffering against its rivals in the HYPERCAR class in qualifying, but aiming to climb back up the rankings in the race.
The Russian had to deal with the first part on hard tyres, which initially made the LMDh from Sant’Agata Bolognese suffer a bit, but once he found the rhythm, a nice climb began.
In the shift of an excellent Mortara, Lamborghini even got close to the Top5 with excellent performances and strategies adopted by the Iron Lynx team, but the cold shower came in the last two hours, when a very unlucky Bortolotti was forced to return to the pits to replace the front right which was sagging due to a slow puncture.
#63 Lamborghini Iron Lynx Lamborghini SC63: Mirko Bortolotti, Andrea Caldarelli, Daniil Kvyat
Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images
“I think it was, to be honest, a rather disappointing weekend. I’m not very happy with how things went and the pace wasn’t what we saw in qualifying. This is the shortest circuit on the calendar, it’s clear that the gaps are smaller, but of course we weren’t competitive,” admits the Trentino rider.
“We had a different strategy in the race and it was great at the start, but the puncture didn’t help us. I think it would have been difficult to finish in the points anyway.”
Kvyat tries to see the glass half full: “Overall it was a positive weekend. We were in a good position from the start and were in contention for the top 10 for a long time, until we had a puncture that unfortunately put us out of contention. We are still working together as a team to improve our performance and I think we have the potential to fight for points.”
Mortara comments: “Interlagos was a tough weekend. The atmosphere was great, the track was pretty nice, but it was a tough event because we had to manage the tyre degradation and I think that was the main challenge in the race.”
“We started at the back, but we managed to move up the order quite well with Daniil. For me it was much more difficult, especially in the second stint, because I had to do a double stint on the softer tyres.”
“Nevertheless, we were fighting for tenth place and had a chance to score some points, but we had a puncture and, unfortunately, that ended our comeback. Hopefully it will be better next time and we will try to improve the car for Austin.”
#63 Lamborghini Iron Lynx Lamborghini SC63: Mirko Bortolotti, Andrea Caldarelli, Daniil Kvyat
Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images
The 17th place finish under the checkered flag almost cries out for revenge, given how things had turned out at a certain point, but the Brazilian stage once again showed the solidity of the SC63, which now has further data and information to analyse to understand where and how to improve in view of the race at the end of the summer in Austin.
“We expected a very demanding race and that was the case. However, we showed promising pace in different conditions and the team once again gave its best on race day,” underlined Emmanuel Esnault, Director of Track Operations.
“Even though luck wasn’t on our side, the drivers did an incredible job adapting to the situations we faced. A true world-class talent.”
“There’s a lot for us to do in terms of development, to take what we’ve learned and put it to work, especially in situations like qualifying.”
“Another challenging race awaits us at the Circuit of The Americas and we look forward to optimising our preparations as we continue to improve every detail of our operations.”
#WEC #Lamborghini #disappointment #confidence #lot
