Argentina, Test: Muller fastest at Termas de Río Hondo

Following the WTCC drivers’ first outing at the Termas de Río Hondo circuit, it was the Chevrolet Cruze of Yvan Muller that set the fastest lap time (1:49.878) in the half-hour Testing session.

Muller’s RML teammate Tom Chilton was second quickest (1:50.246), with the Castrol Honda Team’s Civic of Gabriele Tarquini third (1:50.349) and Rob Huff fourth in the Münnich Motorsport SEAT León (1:50.430).

The top seven places were covered by a fraction over a second, with three Chevrolets, three Hondas and Huff’s solitary SEAT occupied those seven places. The best of the BMW drivers was Tom Coronel, who was tenth fastest (1:51.096) behind the LADA Granta of James Thompson (1:50.954) while the Argentine driver ‘Pechito’ López was an impressive eleventh quickest (1:51.131) in the Wiechers-Sport BMW 320 TC.

The 4.8km track caught out several drivers during this first session: Fernando Monje spun his SEAT at Turn 2 and Franz Engstler’s BMW performed a similar manoeuvre at Turn 10 shortly afterwards. With around three minutes of the session remaining, Chevrolet cars of James Nash and Pepe Oriola made contact at Turn 10, with Oriola spinning as the result of the collision.

Saturday will see the WTCC field take to the track for two thirty-minute Free Practice sessions, before the two-stage Qualifying begins at 15.45 local time (20.45 CET).