Augusto Farfus has been one of the drivers with the best pace during the debut season of the PURE ETCR, the electric touring car series. At 37 years of age, the Brazilian is delighted to join this innovative competition.
Behind the wheel of the Hyundai ETCR, the racer dazzled at the first race in Aragon, and has become one of the benchmarks. “What I’ve been able to bring to the project is my experience in car development, working as part of a team and things like that, but to be honest, it’s all so different compared to anything else, you can’t say it works like a GT car or whatever,” Farfus says of this new experience.
“It’s like comparing sushi and pizza, both are delicious and edible, but also completely different. It’s the same in this case, such a new and beautiful experience,” he added about the features of the PURE ETCR.
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The ETCR cars are used in 300 KW and 500 KW configurations, and the Hyundai driver admits that driving these cars at maximum power is a big challenge: “It’s very difficult to drive with 500 KW because of the enormous power. You have a very small operating window in these cars, that’s why we’ve seen so many mistakes,” he explained.
“You stop 5 meters too late and that’s bye-bye, you won’t be able to stop it. This puts the drivers under pressure and you have very few free practice runs. We were able to test that at Vallelunga and it’s an incredible challenge,” expressed the Curitiba-born driver.
Cars Comparison
On this particular, Farfus stated that the power of the cars are similar. “All the cars have the same propulsion system, so the development is even more difficult, because you have a dominant factor in the car that you cannot modify.”
“You have cars that, as similar as they are, are also completely different. For example, Williams has a standard traction control that is the same for all the cars, but whether it works on one model that doesn’t mean it will also work for the others, so it’s also an incredibly difficult job for them,” he detailed.
The Brazilian feels that the driving style required to push the ETCR cars to the limits puts an extra focus on the rider that is very appealing: “It’s a lot of fun because it’s difficult. The car is a different beast compared to yesterday, and you go out for time trials without knowing what the track is like, and you can’t even test it on the out lap because you have to save tires,” Farfus maintained.
“It’s very challenging because you get into it and you don’t know what’s going to happen, and it has 900 Nm of torque, which is the same as a Bugatti Veyron, and there’s no GT car like that,” he pointed out.
Tournament Planning
Farfus celebrated the PURE ETCR’s great organization despite being a new competition and the threat posed by COVID-19. “It’s great to see that now everything is working as planned, I’m very happy. Considering the COVID and so on, it’s amazing what has been achieved.”
“I am absolutely sure that this championship will take shape in the coming seasons and will be very popular. It will take a while for people to start watching this sport, but it will be a great spectacle, especially once more manufacturers enter the series,” he finished.
Written by I Jhonattan González
