Thed Björk in prime position for first Volvo podium in Japan

Polestar Cyan Racing’s Thed Björk has his best shot at scoring a maiden podium for Volvo in Japan since the Nürburgring back in May after qualifying third for the reversed grid opening race at Motegi, where he’ll start behind the fully ballasted Hondas of Norbert Michelisz and Rob Huff.

The four-time STCC drivers’ champion showed strong pace in practice, finished Free Practice 1 in third, just two spots behind his new tyre-shod team-mate Néstor Girolami, and was set to be quick again in FP2 before running into traffic on his flying lap.

“We’ve been testing and we think we have improved some things in the car, so if I don’t get hit off again like I have been in other races in the past I think I can do a solid race performance,” said Björk to TouringCarTimes.

“However, we don’t have the kilos (that our competitors have), so we still have more things to work on,” he added, refusing to get overexcited with the Volvo’s newfound pace this weekend.

“We want to be able to be faster, but we have to keep working. It’ll be nice to have a podium just for the feeling, but we want to be world champions, and that’s why even if the performance was OK in practice and my new team-mate did a good job, we’d like to improve even more.”