Tarquini takes Brno pole position

Seat’s Gabriele Tarquini has taken a suprising pole position for tommorow’s first WTCC race at the circuit of Brno in the Czech Republik. Everyone had expected a rearwheel-drive car to take the fastest time, but it was Gabriele Tarquini in the frontwheel-driven Seat Leon that snatched pole position away from BMW’s Jörg Müller and Allessandro Zanardi.

The gap between the pole man and second placed Jörg Müller was only 0.045 of a second. Allessandro Zanardi was just 0.067 of a second behind Tarquini. The Italian seemed to be heading for pole position on his last lap, when he was over two tenth’s of a second faster in the first sector, but due to a mistake in the second part of the track, Zanardi returned straight back to the pits, losing second place to teammate Jörg Müller in the mean time.

Another suprise front runner was Robert Huff in his Chevrolet Lacetti. He stayed just ahead of Seat’s Jordi Gene and BMW’s Andy Priaulx. The three Seat’s of Rydell, Muller and Coronel and the Chevrolet of Alain Menu completed the top ten.

Tarquini himself was quite surprissed to be up so high as well. “It was not so easy, especially with the weather we understeered a lot. Car setup was very good. Good to have fresh tyres tomorrow. Look at the performance with lots of weight. It will be hard for Thompson on his tyres because the wear rate is high. Two years ago we were in front because of Rydell, but the BMW is very strong in the race”, he said.

So alot of good hopes for German Jörg Müller, who will be starting from second place in his BMW. “First row is very good. Rear-wheel drive so I hope I can win the start and we’ll see what happens. Will be tough because there are lots of guys close together. Sometimes you make a good start, sometimes you fluff it, so we’ll see what happens”, Müller said.