Photo: Castrol Honda WTC Team

Tiago Monteiro takes pole in a close fight in Morocco

Honda’s Tiago Monteiro has taken pole position for the first race of the 2017 World Touring Car Championship at the Circuit Moulay El Hassan in Morocco, outqualifying the Polestar Volvo of Néstor Girolami by just over two-tenths of a second.

The Portuguese driver had his work cut out for him in the one-lap shootout, despite having led the way in Q2, setting the best time seen today of 1:21.822.

Volvo’s driver Girolami produced a time of 1:22.031 on his one-lap run, the only one of the Swedish manufacturer to make it into the top five and the one-lap shootout. Honda’s Norbert Michelisz was after him on track, but unable to improve on Girolami’s time, missing out by just under a tenth of a second.

Monteiro was just behind Girolami’s stunning first sector time, but clawed it back in sectors two and three to score his first pole since his home race last year, the fourth of his career.

The two Zengõ Hondas of Daniel Nagy and Aurélien Panis were eliminated in the first part of qualifying along with the Sébastien Loeb Racing Citroën of John Filippi, with Nagy just missing out after a last-minute improvement by ROAL Chevrolet driver Tom Coronel.

The second part of qualifying was quickly red flagged when Polestar Cyan Racing’s Nicky Catsburg crashed out at Turn 11, taking no major damage but just blocked the track. The Dutchman was able to rejoin the session once his car was returned to the garage, but would only be sixth fastest, just missing the top ten shootout.

When the session restarted, RC Lada driver Yann Ehrlacher made a similar error to Catsbirg at the same turn, but avoided hitting the barriers.

A late improvement for the third Honda of Ryo Michigami saw him knock Campos Racing’s Esteban Guerrieri out of the top ten, with the Argentinian joining the other Chevrolet of Tom Coronel just outside of the all-important top ten.

Thed Björk would qualify in seventh, with Sébastien Loeb Racing’s Tom Chilton in eighth position. Ryo Michigami will start ahead of RC Lada’s Yann Ehrlacher on the fifth row for the main race, while the French newcomer is set to start the opening race from pole position courtesy of the top ten reversed grid for Race 1.

The first race is scheduled for 16:35 WEST (17:35 CET) on Sunday.