Tarquini leads Honda 1-2-3 on grid

Gabriele Tarquini captured his and Honda’s second straight World Touring Car pole at the Slovakia Ring.

The Japanese marque dominated the session, locking out the top three courtesy of Tiago Monteiro and Norbert Michelisz in the Zengo-run Civic.

Three-time WTCC champion Yvan Muller was the only man who looked capable of denying the Hondas, but fell just short in Q2.

His best lap, a 2m10.941s, was six hundredths of a second slower than Monteiro but left him fourth on the grid for the opening race.

His RML team-mate Tom Chilton was a further two tenths down the road in fifth, while the Bamboo Chevrolets of Alex MacDowall and James Nash were split by defending champion Rob Huff’s SEAT in the fight for sixth.

Marrakech winner Pepe Oriola was ninth, with Tom Coronel taking the reversed-grid race two pole after qualifying 10th.

There was no such fortune for his ROAL BMW team-mate Darryl O’Young, who crashed heavily at Turn 9 just five minutes into Q1.

The Hong Kong racer ran wide on the exit of the corner and hit the barrier heavily, causing severe damage to the right-hand side of his car.

O’Young was able to climb out the car and was cleared after a visit to the medical centre, but his place in tomorrow’s races remains in doubt given the damage to his 320.

The session was halted for 30 minutes to clear the debris and repair the barrier.

Tom Boardman also suffered early Q1 woes. The Briton pulled off without even completing one sector after suffering a misfire from his new engine, which had only been installed ahead of qualifying following similar problems in FP2.

Pos Driver               Car              Time       Gap
  1. Gabriele Tarquini    Honda            2m10.773s
  2. Tiago Monteiro       Honda            2m10.877s  + 0.104s
  3. Norbert Michelisz    Zengo Honda      2m10.889s  + 0.116s
  4. Yvan Muller          RML Chevrolet    2m10.941s  + 0.168s
  5. Tom Chilton          RML Chevrolet    2m11.162s  + 0.389s
  6. Alex MacDowall       Bamboo Chevrolet 2m11.422s  + 0.649s
  7. Robert Huff          Munnich SEAT     2m11.624s  + 0.851s
  8. James Nash           Bamboo Chevrolet 2m11.714s  + 0.941s
  9. Pepe Oriola          Tuenti SEAT      2m11.882s  + 1.109s
 10. Tom Coronel          ROAL BMW         2m12.048s  + 1.275s
 11. Mehdi Bennani        Proteam BMW      2m12.857s  + 2.084s
 12. Michel Nykjaer       NIKA Chevrolet   2m17.614s  + 6.841s
 13. Marc Basseng         Munnich SEAT     2m12.603s   (Q1)
 14. Fredy Barth          Wiechers BMW     2m12.610s   (Q1)
 15. James Thompson       Lada             2m12.641s   (Q1)
 16. Stefano D’Aste       PB BMW           2m12.665s   (Q1)
 17. Charles Ng           Engstler BMW     2m12.891s   (Q1)
 18. Fernando Monje       Campos SEAT      2m12.921s   (Q1)
 19. Rene Munnich         Munnich SEAT     2m13.223s   (Q1)
 20. Franz Engstler       Engstler BMW     2m13.582s   (Q1)
 21. M.Kozlovskiy         Lada             2m14.900s   (Q1)
 22. Darryl O’Young       ROAL BMW         13m16.907   (Q1)
 

Source: http://www.iracing.com/inracingnews/other-news/touring-cars/wtcc/tarquini-leads-honda-1-2-3-on-grid

Kevin Harvick Armour Vienna Sausage Kroger Chevrolet Clint Bowyer Zaxby s Chevrolet