Adrien Tambay blasts to Pool Furious pole position at Sachsenring

Cupra EKS driver Adrien Tambay claimed the Pool Furious pole position at the Sachsenring ahead of title rival Mikel Azcona.

The cold track conditions improved for the Pool Furious qualifying, with the six drivers venturing onto the track as soon as the pit lane exit was opened.

The championship contenders didn’t disappoint in their first run in Q1, with Tambay setting the fastest lap time at 1:28.173, closely followed by Mikel Azcona, driving the Hyundai Veloster N ETCR, just 0.082 seconds behind.

Norbert Michelisz was third for Hyundai Motorsport N in his first outing, albeit eight-tenths off the pace, with Romeo Ferraris’ Bruno Spengler in fourth position, just five-thousandths further away.

Jordi Gené was fifth, with Luca Filippi closing the classification.

“It wasn’t a perfect lap, I made a few mistakes, so there is some room for improvement,” said Azcona after the Q1. “It was only my fourth lap in this track in my life, so I think we can make some adjustments and fight for the pole position.”

Filippi was the first driver to establish a reference lap time in the Q2, but it was soon improved by team-mate Spengler and the Hyundai drivers Michelisz and Azcona.

But it would be Tambay who, again would dominate the field with a time of 1:28.250, followed by Michelisz and Azcona.

In the combined result Tambay scored the pole position, increasing his lead over Ekström to 17 points in the championship, followed by Azcona and Michelisz, the three drivers going through to the quarter final 1.

Spengler was fourth, followed by Filippi, with Gené closing the classification, and the latter three drives qualifying for quarter final 2.

Next for the FIA ETCR is the Pool Fast Quarter finals at 15:40 CEST.