– Nick Cassidy had a difficult start to his debut in the WEC Hypercar class. The New Zealander, who drove for Peugeot for the first time in Imola, admitted his own mistakes after an excursion into the gravel trap, but sees the main problem of the French manufacturer in the car’s lack of basic speed.
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Cassidy took over the Peugeot #93 (di Resta/Vandoorne/Cassidy) after just over two hours of racing. Immediately after exiting the pits, he lost the rear on cold tires when turning into the Tamburello chicane. After a violent counter-swing, the car ended up in the gravel.
Although the car could be recovered and Cassidy continued the race, the time loss of two laps could no longer be made up.
Speaking to Motorsport.com Netherlands, a sister platform of Motorsport-Total.com within the Motorsport Network, the Peugeot driver is self-critical in retrospect:
“I simply lost the car on cold tires. It’s a stupid situation, absolutely not ideal. But at the same time, I’m not the first person this has happened to, and I certainly won’t be the last. That’s just how it is.”
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Already during the prologue, Marco Sörensen had crashed the Aston Martin Valkyrie after a similar mistake. Cassidy therefore emphasized that he was in good company with this mishap, but regretted the timing:
“It’s just a shame that it happened in my very first race. I pushed. We weren’t particularly fast, so I wanted to get everything out of the situation and probably overdid it a bit.”
After the recovery, the remaining stints for Cassidy went largely smoothly, even if he was hardly involved in direct duels due to blue flags and the deficit. However, the pace of the 9X8 worries him.
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“To be honest: We simply need more performance if we want to fight against the others,” he concludes soberly. If the car’s foundation is right, the rest will come naturally.
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