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Nordschleife, Tests : Muller leads López in first session

Muller got off to a good start

By Franck Drui

26 May 2016 - 13:57

Yvan Muller got off to a good start at the FIA WTCC Race of Germany at the Nürburgring Nordschleife, leading Testing ahead of Citroën team-mate José María López.

Having led the way earlier on in the one-hour session, Muller returned to top spot just after the chequered flag with a time of 8m39.950s. López then moved up to second place, 0.877s slower than the Frenchman.

Rob Huff had sat top of the pile for Honda during the final five minutes of the allotted time. He ended up third ahead of team-mate Tiago Monteiro, with the fastest WTCC Trophy competitor Tom Chilton beating the final factory Honda driver Norbert Michelisz to fifth.

Hugo Valente was the quickest of the LADA racers in seventh, followed by Mehdi Bennani, Thed Björk and Nicky Catsburg. Gabriele Tarquini sat just outside the top 10 in 11th, one place ahead of Nürburgring expert Sabine Schmitz. Tom Coronel was 13th after sustaining a flat tyre on his second flying lap.

Pos.	Driver	Team	Car	Time
1	Yvan Muller	Citroen Total WTCC	Citroen	8:39.950
2	Jose Maria Lopez	Citroen Total WTCC	Citroen	8:40.827
3	Rob Huff	Honda Racing Team JAS	Honda	8:42.220
4	Tiago Monteiro	Honda Racing Team JAS	Honda	8:44.512
5	Tom Chilton	Sebastien Loeb Racing	Citroen	8:45.380
6	Norbert Michelisz	Honda Racing Team JAS	Honda	8:46.095
7	Hugo Valente	LADA Sport	Lada	8:46.947
8	Mehdi Bennani	Sebastien Loeb Racing	Citroen	8:47.471
9	Thed Bjork	Polestar Cyan	Volvo	8:48.901
10	Nicky Catsburg	LADA Sport	Lada	8:49.923
11	Gabriele Tarquini	LADA Sport	Lada	8:51.260
12	Sabine Schmitz	Munnich Motorsport	Chevrolet	8:55.508
13	Tom Coronel	ROAL Motorsport	Chevrolet	8:55.547
14	John Filippi	Campos Racing	Chevrolet	8:59.742
15	Grégoire Demoustier	Sebastien Loeb Racing	Citroen	9:03.509
16	Ferenc Ficza	Zengo	Honda	9:31.200
17	Fredrik Ekblom	Polestar Cyan	Volvo	13:30.382