Photo: TCR World Tour

Néstor Girolami heads first free practice at Zhuzhou in China

By

Néstor Girolami put his BRC Racing-prepared Hyundai Elantra N TCR on top in the first free practice session of the FIA TCR World Tour weekend at Zhuzhou in China.

The Argentinian driver lapped the circuit in 1:44.430 to beat Lynk & Co Cyan Racing’s Santiago Urrutia by close to half a second.

Points leader Yann Ehrlacher rose to third place on his last attempt, just 0.068 seconds behind his team-mate, while local hero Ma Qing Hua made it three Lynk & Cos in the top four.

Reigning Supercars Championship champion Will Brown started his one-off FIA TCR World Tour appearance strongly with fifth place for HMO Customer Racing, 13 thousands of a second behind Ma.

Cupra driver Aurélien Comte was sixth fastest ahead of title contender Thed Björk who claimed eighth. Top Honda driver Ignacio Montenegro, reigning champion Norbert Michelisz and Lo Sze Ho rounded off the top ten, 1.1 seconds from the top time.

Title contender Esteban Guerrieri of GOAT Racing had a tough start to the penultimate race weekend of 2025, putting his Honda in only 15th place, more than 2.5 seconds from the top time.

The second practice session of the weekend starts at 16:00 local time/09:00 CET.