WTCC - Pau - Rounds 7 & 8 - Preview

FIA World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) 2007
Rounds 7 & 8 - 2nd/3rd June 2007, Pau - Preview

BMW touring car drivers line up for the first street race of the season
in Pau.

It is not only in Formula One circles that races on spectacular street circuits
are a hot topic at present. This coming weekend, the FIA World Touring Car
Championship (WTCC) will make its first visit of the season to the tight and
twisty confines of a city-centre track. The 67th Grand Prix de Pau will see the
BMW drivers continue their hunt for championship points in the foothills of the
French Pyrenees. The WTCC teams will also go racing on street circuits in Porto
and Macau later on in the year.

BMW has established a firm grip on the drivers' and manufacturers'
championships going into rounds seven and eight of the WTCC. BMW Team Germany's
Jörg Müller travels to Pau at the top of the standings with 31 points to date.
BMW Team UK driver Andy Priaulx (GBR) is lying in second place on the same
points as Müller, while Augusto Farfus (BRA) - also competing for BMW Team
Germany - is back in third on 28 points. BMW heads the manufacturers'
championship on 81 points, a 19-point advantage over SEAT.

While the BMW Team Italy-Spain drivers, Alessandro Zanardi (ITA) and Félix
Porteiro, will be hoping to get their points totals clocking up again in Pau
after a difficult time of late, the top three find themselves facing a variety
of different challenges. Müller and Priaulx, for example, will have to contend
with 55 kilograms of handicap weight - more than any other driver in the field.
This success ballast becomes a serious burden at the Circuit de Pau, which is
littered with uphill sections.

Farfus, meanwhile, has an even tougher job on his hands. The 23-year-old was
hit with a grid penalty after his collision with Tom Coronel (NLD) in Valencia
and will start Sunday morning's race ten places further back from where he
qualifies. As with the majority of street circuits, overtaking is decidedly
tricky in Pau. Which makes it impossible to overstate the importance for all
the drivers, and Farfus in particular, of a good qualifying performance as the
Brazilian will be carrying 40 kg of success ballast in France.

Müller already knows what it feels like to stand on the top step of the podium
in Pau. More than a decade ago the German driver won a Formula 3000 race here -
and now he returns as the leader of the World Touring Car Championship.

Jörg Müller (BMW Team Germany):
"It has been a while since I last raced in Pau. It was 1996, in fact, and I won
the Formula 3000 race on my first visit there. I still remember lapping
everybody in the field up to Kenny Bräck in second place. The course will suit
touring car racing. The racing line will frequently take the cars over
kerbstones, which is quite unusual for a street circuit.

Spring and damper tuning will be extremely important here. Otherwise it is a
typical street circuit with crash barriers hugging the track on both sides. As
far as speeds are concerned, this circuit lies somewhere between the super-fast
Macau and rather slower Porto. The fact that I'm currently leading the
championship will not influence my approach to the race weekend. You need to
maintain full concentration in Pau, though, as any mistakes will be punished
immediately."

History and background:

The Circuit de Pau has one of the richest histories in international motor
racing. The first car race through the narrow streets of the French city was
held in 1901. In the 1930s Pau was the venue for the first ever "Grand Prix" -
up to that point, this had been a billing reserved for horse races.

The Grand Prix de Pau has been an institution in French motor sport ever since.
Between 1950 and 1963 Pau also played host to Formula One eight times, although
the race there was not part of the official World Championship. However, the
list of winners still reads like a "who's who" of motor sport at the time: Juan
Manuel Fangio, Alberto Ascari, Jack Brabham and Jim Clark were among those to
celebrate victory on the now 2.760-kilometre-long course.

Pau then became a regular port of call for the European Formula 2 Championship
up to 1984, before the series was succeeded by Formula 3000 the following year.
And that left the challenge presented by the demanding street circuit primarily
in the hands of up-and-coming young drivers - many of whom have gone on to
enjoy a successful career in motor sport. Jean Alesi, Gil de Ferran and Juan
Pablo Montoya are among those to have cut their racing teeth in Formula 3000.

BMW Team Germany driver Jörg Müller has fond memories of Pau from his Formula
3000 days, having lined up on the grid there for the second race of the 1996
season. After 72 laps, Kenny Bräck was the only driver not to have been lapped
by the now 37-year-old from Hückelhoven. Müller crossed the finish line 5.274
seconds ahead of the Swede to take the race win on his way to the championship
title that year. No other current WTCC driver can claim to have a Grand Prix de
Pau victory on their CV.

BMW Sauber F1 Team driver Nick Heidfeld is another to have raced in Pau earlier
on in his career, finishing third in the Formula 3000 race at the circuit in
1998. The German ace also secured the championship title in the junior series
the following year, although by this time Pau was no longer on the Formula 3000
calendar. However, the circuit did play host to numerous Formula 3 races under
the "Grand Prix de Pau" banner up to 2005.

The WTCC race will mark the 67th running of the Grand Prix de Pau. However,
this will be the first time that the World Touring Car Championship has stopped
off in the Pyrenees. Pau is the second new venue on the WTCC bill in 2007, the
teams having already visited Zandvoort earlier this year.

Pau has a population of just over 78,000 and is the largest city in the
Aquitaine region after Bordeaux. Its close proximity to the Pyrenees has made
it a regular stage venue for the Tour de France. At the last count the world's
most famous cycle race had passed through the city on 60 occasions.

The two WTCC races will each be run over 19 laps, a race distance of 52.44
kilometres. Race 1 is scheduled to get under way on Sunday at 10.05 hrs and
will be broadcast live on Eurosport 2. The second race will start at 15.35 hrs
and can be followed on Eurosport International.