Yvan Muller takes pole position in Hungary ahead of Michelisz

Yvan Muller deprived local driver Norbert Michelisz pole position at home with a sensational lap in qualifying of 1:53.426, breaking his own lap record by over a second.

The RML Chevrolet driver waited to show his hand in the second part of qualifying, after Gabriele Tarquini had led the way in Q1 with a time of 1:54.076.

Muller’s first lap was the one that would claim his second pole position of the season, setting a time of 1:53.426 on his only run in the session. His closest competitor was Honda’s Tiago Monteiro after the first run as Gabriele Tarquini aborted his lap after a mistake in Turn 12.

Tarquini and Michelisz went out for a second stab at pole positon, whilst ROAL Motorsport’s Tom Coronel left his lap until the last minute and set a time which secured the BMW driver fifth on the grid.

Tarquini’s lap of 1:53.953 put him briefly second fastest, but he was immediately outperformed by Zengõ Motorsport’s Norbert Michelisz, just under four-tenths down on Muller’s time and secured the outside front-row for his home race.

Muller will start race one followed by the three Hondas, with Tom Coronel the best placed BMW in fifth. Tom Chilton was the second highest placed Chevrolet in sixth ahead of James Nash, who was the fastest Yokohama Trophy runner in seventh for bamboo-engineering.

Rob Huff was the only SEAT to make into Q2 and qualified eight, which will see the reigning champion line-up third on the grid for race two.

Proteam Racing’s Mehdi Bennani was ninth fastest and will start from second on the reversed grid for race two, with bamboo-engineering’s Alex MacDowall tenth for race one and on pole position for race two.

Tuenti Racing SEAT’s Pepe Oriola just missed out on the top 12 with the 13th fastest time in Q1, with James Thompson the quickest of the two Lada’s in 16th.

“I do my best every qualifying. I’m pleased as that lap was a great lap, it wasn’t far from a perfect lap, and that’s what I have to do to keep the Hondas behind,” said Muller.

“We’ve stayed focussed even though the last two weekends weren’t very comfortable for us, and we’ll stay focussed and fight until the end.”

Race one starts at 12:35 CET tomorrow and race two at 14:50.