Rob Huff leads very wet final practice session at Ningbo
Münnich Motorsport’s Rob Huff was fastest of all in the final practice session for the WTCC at Ningbo in China, leading the way throughout the 45-minute session, where the rain had intensified since this morning’s first practice session.
The 2012 champion had taken pole position in the supporting CTCC Super Cup race inbetween the WTCC practice sessions, while the rain levels continued to increase.
Huff led the session throughout, setting a time of 2:01.975 on his first lap and at this point was over two seconds clear of his competition.
The times improved over the session, with Huff’s best lap time of 2:00.585 putting him fastest at the end, despite late improvements from the Polestar Cyan Volvos of Nicky Catsburg, with the Dutchman second fastest, just over half a second behind.
Esteban Guerrieri was third fastest in the Campos Chevrolet Cruze, despite a minor excursion across the dirt at Turn 18 at the start of the session.
Tom Chilton made a late improvement to go fourth fastest in the Sébastien Loeb Racing-run Citroën, 1.3 seconds behind Huff, with Gabriele Tarquini again the fastest of the Honda drivers in fifth, 1.3 seconds off the pace.
Yann Ehrlacher was the best-placed of the three RC Motorsport Ladas in sixth position.
16 cars took part in the session, with Zengõ Motorsport successfully getting Daniel Nagy out on circuit, but Zsolt Szabo missed the second session as well with an undisclosed engine issue, and the Hungarian will be forced to take part in qualifying with no track time if at all.
Qualifying is next for the WTCC at 15:15 CST (9:15 CET).
