With less than one week to go until the Losail International Circuit hosts FIA WTCC DHL Race of Qatar, Mehdi Bennani has revealed why it feels like a second ‘home’ event.
The Moroccan, who became the first Arabic driver to win an FIA world championship motor race when he won at WTCC Race of China in 2014, will head to the Middle East as the WTCC Trophy winner for 2016following another impressive season driving a Sébastien Loeb Racing Citroën C-Elysée WTCC.
He said: “For sure Morocco and Qatar are very close, the people are very close because there are a lot of partnerships between both countries. And when I race in Qatar it’s really like Marrakesh so I hope to have a fantastic race. It could be a bit more special now I am already world champion. And I think I will be even stronger because I will have nothing to lose and nothing to win and in the end it could good so I will do my best to do two strong races and get some good points overall because I need to think about this overall championship. I hope to score more points to be close to the top six or top five.” Bennani is sixth in the WTCC Drivers’ standings with 176 points but could end up a career-high third in the table if results go his way in Qatar.

Honda WTCC hopes rise
as weight falls
Honda’s hopes of a victorious end to the 2016 FIA World Touring Car Championship have been handed a huge boost with confirmation that the five Civic WTCCs will run with 30 kilograms of compensation weight at WTCC DHL Race of Qatar next week. It’s half the amount carried by the Japanese machines during the last event in China and 50 kilograms less than the extra load that will be fitted to Citroën’s pacesetting C-Elysée WTCC in the Middle East. While the Citroëns have run with the maximum permitted 80 kilograms all season, the amount of success ballast in the Hondas has fluctuated throughout the campaign. Apart from the opening two events of the season in France and Slovakia, when they ran with zero additional weight, not since Russia in early June have the the Hondas run at 30 kilograms.
As at WTCC Race of China, the trio of factory LADA Vestas and pair of Volvo S60 Polestar TC1s will run without compensation weight at the Losail International Circuit. Drivers of the Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 will also benefit from running at the 1100kg minimum base weight in Qatar. The compensation weight system is designed to equalise performance in the WTCC through a lap time difference in seconds calculation based on average lap times from the previous three race weekends.