Attila Tassi leads the first free practice session at Zandvoort
KCMG Honda driver Attila Tassi led the way in the first practice session at Circuit Zandvoort, outpacing the field by three-tenths of a second following a late flyer in his Civic TCR, with local hero Tom Coronel second fastest in his Comtoyou Racing Cupra TCR, and with BRC Racing Team Hyundai driver Augusto Farfus third.
Tassi was quick out of the box in the 45 minute session, before the Cyan Racing-run Lynk & Cos of Yvan Muller and Thed Björk jumped to the fore, indicating an improvement of pace compared to last weekend at the Slovakiaring.
With just over ten minutes left, the two PWR Racing Cupras of Mikel Azcona and Daniel Haglöf jumped to first and second, before both were outpaced by the Hyundai of Augusto Farfus.
The final improvements came from Coronel, and then Tassi, with the 19-year-old Tassi winding up fastest of all by some margin in what was otherwise a close session.
Benjamin Leuchter wound up the fastest of the four Sébastien Loeb Racing Volkswagen Golf GTI TCRs in sixth, ahead of championship leader Néstor Girolami’s Honda in seventh.
Thed Björk was the top Lynk & Co driver in eighth overall, eight-tenths off the pace.
Niels Langeveld was the best-placed of the four Audis in 12th, by far and away, with the other three Audis of Jean-Karl Vernay, Frédéric Vervisch and Gordon Shedden bringing up the rear in 20th, 25th and 26th positions.
The two Alfa Romeos, which were strong last week, also struggled, with Ma Qing Hua down in 23rd and Kevin Ceccon in 24th place.
The second free practice session is scheduled for 15:20 CEST.
