This coming weekend in Morocco, (12th and 13th of April) the tenth season of the FIA World Championship Touring Car Championship, WTCC, will officially get underway and it will be a new era for the series with new regulations, cars and manufacturers in place. Driving the Honda Civic, Tiago Monteiro will be the only Portuguese racer taking part in what is one of the toughest championships on the international motorsport scene.
After an intense winter, the first race weekend of the season, to be held on the Circuit Moulay El Hassan, will soon discover which teams have the advantage over their rivals. While some have done a solid job during the offseason, Tiago Monteiro is aware that development of the Honda Civic still has room for improvement.
For the Portuguese driver, the most important thing this weekend will be to get off to a good start and score points. "It will be an adrenaline rush. Nobody can predict what will happen in the first race or who will be better prepared. There are a lot of unknowns. This weekend, we will face new regulations, new engines, new drivers and teams. We will start almost from scratch. It will be very interesting at all levels," said Tiago Monteiro.
Cautious about his ambitions and those of Honda, Tiago noted: "The aim is to get into the points. We did a good job during the offseason, but we are fully aware that there is still work to do and the Honda Civic has huge room for improvement. It would be pointless to set overly ambitious goals. We must be realistic; we will have a better idea of the hierarchy at the end of the Moroccan weekend."