Tiago Monteiro will start from 17th on the grid in Shanghai

Tiago Monteiro Secured the 17th best time during qualifying for the penultimate round of the FIA World Touring Car Championship, WTCC ,which takes place in Shanghai this weekend.

This is the second time the WTCC has stopped in China but it is the first time that they will race on the same track that hosts the Formula One Championship, the Shanghai International Circuit.

Tiago Monteiro, Honda Civic Super

Photo by: xpb.cc

Tiago Monteiro placed the JAS Motorsport Honda Civic in 4th place in Friday practice, but unfortunately he was unable to repeat this feat in qualifying and will now start from 17th on the grid for both races that will serve as a Chinese testing ground as JAS Honda Motorsport prepare for the 2013 season.

"We must not forget that this is only the second race weekend that we have participated in and we discover a lot of things about the car," said Tiago Monteiro, "The track slips a lot and it is difficult to predict how the grip will evolve, which makes the task a little harder.

Finally, even though the lap is long, with about 30 cars on track, we have to deal with traffic and this posed a problem in qualifying."

Tiago Monteiro was 14th on his first set of tires and was back out of the pits with 2 minutes and 20 seconds remaining in the session.

He had to complete a very quick out lap in order to cross the line in time. Then he suffered with traffic in the first sector, then recorded his best time in the second.

Unfortunately, he was 156 milliseconds off recording the 12th fastest time in the first qualifying session, where he needed to be to take place in the second.

"Despite the length of the lap, it was very tight and we only missed 12th place by a fraction. Without traffic and with a little more time to fully exploit the tires, it could made all the difference, but I don't have any regrets because our priority is to lay a solid foundation for next season," said Monteiro.

"From this point of view it was a success because we now understand the Honda Civic even better and its behavior on a technical circuit such as Shanghai, which is very different from that of Suzuka where we raced two weeks ago.

In the races the objective will be to make full use of the potential of the Honda Civic and try to get back into the top 10."

Source: Tiago Monteiro