José María López rules out Mercedes F1-style crash at Citroën

Championship leader José María López has put faith in his Citroën team and team-mate Yvan Muller ahead of tomorrow’s race at the Nürburgring Nordschleife, indicating an inter-team collision at the start as seen in the last round of the Formula 1 World Championship between Mercedes team-mates Nico Rosberg and Lewis Hamilton is unlikely.

López romped to pole position at the Nürburgring Nordschleife in the 60-minute qualifying session, with Muller his only realistic threat around the 25.3km circuit, but a self-confessed error from the Frenchman meant he was unable to take the fight directly to López, who had time in hand after his second flying lap, and on his third run took pole by over 3.5 seconds around the 25.3km circuit with a time of 8:35.541.

On whether López expects to see a fight from team-mate Muller on race day, with Citroën’s other main rival Honda struggling so far this weekend with Norbert Michelisz their best-placed driver in fourth, López explained:

“The team lets us fight always, but I believe we are clever guys and good team-mates and we won’t do what has happened in another series,” he said.

“This is the spirit of the team, we drive for our brand, we defend the colours of Citroën, so the last thing we want to do is to both not finish.”

López’s time beat his own qualifying record from 2015 by two seconds, and extends his lead in the provisional championship standings to 19 over Honda’s Tiago Monteiro.

“(After I left here) last year, I’ve just been waiting to come back,” said López. “Of course, with a professional team we worked hard and it’s amazing to beat my lap from last year, especially with 80kg (of compensation weight).

“It’s all about the confidence in the car, but the fact that I put together a good lap on my second run gave me the confidence to try a bit more…but when I saw the lap at the end I was surprised.”