Tarquini-Muller, Muller-Tarquini

Qualifying at Monza turned out a SEAT show, or was it a Muller & Tarquini show? The two SEAT drivers, both at the top of the championship standings, fought hard with each other over pole position, changing first and second position with each other continuously. In the end it was Yvan Muller who got the better of Tarquini, beating him with an advantage of 0.044 of a second.

In third and fourth were the other two SEAT Léon TDI’s. Jordi Gené took third ahead of Rickard Rydell. Tiago Monteiro was the only SEAT Léon TDI driver who was not at the top of the field. He would have been in the top five, had he not ran wide at the Parabolica at the end of the session, having to go through the gravel.

Now it was Augusto Farfus who took fifth place, and was subsequently the fastest non-SEAT TDI driver. Nicola Larini and Alain Menu took sixth and seventh in their Chevrolet Lacetti. Rob Huff was split from his team mates by Andy Priaulx, and had to settle for nineth.

James Thompson had a hard time during qualifying. Without a team mate giving him a tow and 46 kilos of succes ballast, he only managed 13th.

A man who had a team mate to give him a tow, but didn’t use it, was Tom Coronel. He had to pay the penalty for this, and only finished in 19th. His team mate Duarte Félix da Costa finished just half a second behind Coronel in his first WTCC qualifying session. He will start from 21st on the grid tomorrow.

New man at Chevrolet, Manabu Orid, didn’t get a tow from his team mates either, and finished in 20th, 2.8 seconds slower than the fastest man and 2 seconds slower than fastest Chevrolet driver Nicola Larini.