In what was a great weekend for the Liqui Moly Team Engstler, blessed by Nicki Thiim’s pole position and victory in Race 1 and by Lorenzo Veglia’s first podium, Mikhail Grachev provided the icing on the cake as he was elected Man of the Race.
The motivation that awarded the recognition to the Russian driver was: for not giving up in a very difficult weekend.
And Grachev did not give up. He had to face first with the fact that his new car – a SEAT León rented from an Italian team – arrived at the Algarve circuit only on Saturday lunch time. Meaning that Grachev missed the free practice sessions and sat in the car only for the Qualifying, which explains why he was not able to go through to Q2.
He started Race 1 from 14^thand recovered up to sixth under the chequered flag. The team asked for neutralization of the parc fermé in order to fix some damage and this meant that Grachev was pushed even further back to 16^thon the grid for Race 2. And yet, once again he was able to recover and finish sixth once again. A dogged performance