Team Honda won its first Manufacturers Against the Clock team time trial of the 2017 FIA World Touring Car Championship season, more than three seconds ahead of Team Volvo Polestar at WTCC Race of Hungary.
In the third WTCC MAC3 of the campaign, Ryo Michigami led his Honda team-mates away from the line, with Tiago Monteiro and Norbert Michelisz running closely behind the Japanese to secure Honda’s first WTCC MAC3 triumph of 2017 and 12 points in its bid to win the World Touring Car Championship for Manufacturers.
However, despite claiming victory in WTCC MAC3, the success was tinged with an element of frustration as Team Principal Alessandro Mariani explained. “It’s very good to secure our first WTCC MAC3 victory of 2017 because it helps our position in the Manufacturers’ championship. But overall qualifying did not go as we’d hoped. The circuit di not evolve as we’d expected when the sun came out and we didn’t go the right way with the set-up.”
It was an off-song WTCC MAC3 for Volvo Polestar. After enjoying WTCC MAC3 success in Morocco and Italy this year, a reported vibration issue hit Néstor Girolami’s Volvo S60 Polestar and prevented the trio, which also included Thed Björk and Nicky Catsburg, from running in formation. And with the clock stopping once the last of a team’s three cars crosses the line, the Swedish firm lost out on victory as a result.