Two poles at Macau for Bamboo Engineering

Bamboo Engineering have enjoyed a strong qualifying session at Macau, despite having to work all night to repair Darryl O’Young’s Chevrolet Cruze after a crash in testing. The Hong Kong driver rewarded the team with the independents’ class pole, whilst Alex MacDowall will start first for race two.

O’Young claimed his first Yokohama independents’ trophy class pole of the 2012 season, as he has done at the Macau street circuit for the last three years, as he completes the season with the Silverstone-based squad.

O’Young will start sixth on the grid for the first race, one spot ahead of independents’ points leader Norbert Michelisz for the rolling start for race one.

“I waited quite late to get my first pole of the season, but actually I’m really happy to be here today as yesterday I was a little over-ambitious at Mandarin, and I crashed the car pretty hard,” said O’Young.

“The guys at Bamboo Engineering were working on the car till 5am in the morning and didn’t sleep, just going back to the hotel to have a shower, so they did an amazing job to get my car here, they did the job so I had to the job back for them.”

O’Young’s team-mate Alex MacDowall will start from provisional pole position for the second race thanks to setting the tenth fastest time in Q2. It will be the first time the British driver has started at the head of the field in the WTCC.

“I think it’s a good position to be in as you can’t really overtake over here,” said MacDowall to TouringCarTimes. “The Chevrolets could overtake a bit last year but that’s because it’s got quite a good high-speed balance, and I’m in one, so hopefully if I can keep Pepe (Oriola) behind me who’s fighting for the independents’ title.”

“Huffy told me if you’re within four seconds by the end of the weekend you’ve done a good job. When he first said that I thought ‘four seconds?’, but coming here now I understand, yes he’s right. It’s pretty exceptional around here.”