Menu on pole as Chevrolet secures manufacturers’ title

Alain Menu confirmed his strong performance from the practice sessions to take his second straight pole position for the first race at Suzuka. The Swiss driver took pole ahead of his team mates Yvan Muller in second, just 0.065 seconds behind, and Rob Huff in third.

Chevrolet secured the manufacturers title thanks to the qualifying points from this session on 770 points ahead of BMW on 490 and SEAT on 474 points. The qualifying points also means that Muller jumps up in to the championship lead, just one point ahead of team mate Huff.

Alex MacDowall made it a Chevrolet 1-2-3-4 with fourth position ahead of the top non-Chevrolet driver in the form of Mehdi Bennani in fifth with his BMW 320 TC.

Gabriele Tarquini was best of the SEAT drivers in sixth, just under four tenths from Menu’s time, with Tom Coronel in seventh and Aleksei Dudukalo in eighth. Pepe Oriola and Stefano D’Aste rounded off the top ten, securing first and second on the grid for the second race thanks to the top ten reversed grid.

Tiago Monteiro was unable to break in to the top of the Q2 session with the new Honda Civic, finishing 11th just over a second behind the top. But the Honda driver provided drama in the Q1 session, breaking in to the top twelve with just seconds left of the session. Darryl O’Young was last of the Q2 drivers in 12th, having a big moment on one of his laps in the final corner.