Néstor Girolami scores pole position for Hungary Race 1
Néstor Girolami has taken the second pole position for the Münnich Motorsport Honda squad of the season for Saturday’s race, after stealing pole position from Cyan Racing Lynk & Co driver Yvan Muller during the final moments of the session.
The Argentinian set a best time of 1:52.586, two-tenths of a second clear of Muller’s 03 TCR at the end of the single-part 30-minute session, with Girolami’s team-mate Esteban Guerrieri putting his car in third on his final run.
Aurélien Panis put in a stunning improvement at the end of the session to put his Comtoyou Racing Cupra TCR fourth on the grid ahead of Yann Ehrlacher’s Lynk & Co, with Thed Björk sixth in the third-best of the Cyan Racing-run cars.
Two-time Scandinavian champion Johan Kristoffersson scored both his and Volkswagen’s best qualifying result in WTCR this year with seventh, with the WRT Audi of Jean-Karl Vernay eighth, and Augusto Farfus the fastest of the BRC Racing Team Hyundais in ninth ahead of Morocco Race 3 pole-sitter Frédéric Vervisch’s Comtoyou Racing Audi.
Multiple drivers saw their best laps deleted due to track limits infringements, most typically at Turn 11, with three of the four Hyundai drivers still not having set a valid lap time past the half-way point of the session.
Final warnings were handed out to Cyan Racing’s Andy Priaulx and Mulsanne’s Kevin Ceccon for repeatedly cutting the track during the end of the session.
The first race is scheduled for 15:15 CEST.
