Tom Coronel admitted that he came close to stopping racing in touring cars after a difficult 2018 season, before ultimately deciding to embark on a dual campaign in the FIA World Touring Car Cup and TCR Europe in 2019.

Coronel ended the inaugural WTCR season in 2018 just 22nd in the drivers’ championship standings after scoring just six top ten finishes all year, with the Dutchman particularly struggling in the second half of the year when he missed the points in 12 consecutive races.

The 46-year-old starts the new season by switching from Honda to CUPRA machinery in WTCR, although he will continue to campaign his Civic Type-R from 2018 in the TCR Europe series.

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Such was the difficulty of the previous year, that Coronel admitted he had considered whether he should continue racing towards the end of the season.

Whilst assessing his options, Coronel an Alfa Romeo Giulietta with Romeo Ferraris, before settling upon racing a CUPRA due to the possibility of a more extensive pre-season testing programme.

“It’s nice to know that you go home, and you are not there filling up the field and making other people heroes, which I have been doing for the last year,” said Coronel.

“Last year was one of those years when I had to say ‘do I stop racing because I’m not there anymore’? And then I said, it was an easy [decision]. I could choose between the Alfa, which I tested at Vallelunga, and the CUPRA.

“I always need my moment of fame, and I had zero last season. That has never happened before in my career. So, it’s easy – this year it has to happen for myself.

“I said where can I improve and that’s left-foot braking, so I’ve got a big simulator which I still go ill in sometimes, and I’m learning.”

Coronel says that one of the hardest elements of switching to TCR machinery was how to extract the most out of the gearbox, which he says is completely different to what he was used to in the rest of his racing career.

“There are two generations in this championship: the analogue and the digital generation, and I’m from the analogue generation. When we went from WTCC to WTCR it became more digital, especially in the gear changing.

“Normally a racing driver decides on the shift up and down, and I was very strong on that part, especially entering the corner.

“Now, you can flip or do what you want but nothing happens – the computer decides what you do. This is a really big change for myself. This is why you cannot be different on that part.

“I was different also on the braking, so I just said to myself ‘left foot braking, this is it’. It’s the first year that I’m doing left-foot braking. I started with that in my first test when I went out at Zandvoort and that has caused me some headaches – a few flat-sports here and there.

“After 28 or 29 years of motor racing I am still learning, but you have to.”

Coronel hopes that taking part in two different touring car series will pay dividends as he looks to get as much mileage as possible under his belt whilst he changes his driving style.

The news that Boutsen Ginion Racing would not be continuing as a Honda customer team in the 2019 WTCR also required a rethink of plans for Coronel, who had originally signed up for a two-year programme with the Honda.

“I’ve always been busy in motor racing. There have been years in which I did three championships: I did the Le Mans Series, touring cars and then the long-distance races. But just now it’s more concentrated on the touring cars.

“Mileage makes you sharp, makes you stronger and it makes you better, because I still have many things to learn with these types of cars.

“It was a two-year project with Boutsen and Honda, and that’s why I’m doing TCR Europe. It’s still at least a two-year project, but just in a different championship.”