Tarquini flies to secure pole position

Gabriele Tarquini (1:38.265) claimed his second pole of the season for SR-Sport in Zolder today after rain brought an early end to proceedings. Teammate Jordi Gené (1:38.430) will line up alongside him on the grid for Race 1 while Chevrolet’s Alain Menu (1:38.494) will start third.

Norbert Michelisz (1:39.072) finished top rookie in sixth for the Zengö-Dension Team while local racer Pierre-Yves Corthals (1:39.610) was top Independent in 13th on his season debut for Exagon Engineering.

After a closely fought Q1 with the top ten cover by less than 0.4-seconds, the drivers only had chance for one flying lap in Q2 before the heavens opened making it impossible for anyone to improve.

Q1 – On a dry track Andy Priaulx was quickest out the box with his first time of 1:39.349 already much faster than any time this weekend so far. As the times continued to drop, the final minutes saw a jostle for positions with Michelisz improving on his final run to knock SR-Sport’s Tom Coronel out of the top ten.

Darryl O’Young was in the top ten for the majority of Q1 following his promising start to the weekend. However, as the top drivers improved further he ended 14th with a time of 1:39.824. Belgium’s Vincent Radermecker (1:40.003) will start 16th for Chevrolet.
The top ten going forward into Q2 were Menu, Monteiro, Tarquini, Priaulx, Muller, Gené, Michelisz, Farfus, Barth and Huff.

Corthals clocked the 13th fastest lap, emerging as the best of the Independents ahead of O’Young and Kristian Poulsen.

Q2 – The 10-minute Q2 session was over quickly as after eight of the top ten had only recorded their first flying laps the rain began to fall. All but the BMW Team RBM cars had set a fast time before the rain fell with Farfus and Priaulx’s decision to wait costing them dearly.

The final order after one flying lap was therefore Tarquini from Gené, Menu, Muller, Michelisz, Barth, Monteiro, Priualx and Farfus. With the track now wet Tarquini’s second pole position of the season, following his first at Marrakech last month, was secured.