RML’s Yvan Muller continued his early dominance of the times in Argentina by once again beating team-mate Tom Chilton to the top time in first free practice at the Autódromo Termas de Río Hondo.
Click here for the full first practice times.
Muller, who had topped the times in Friday testing, posted a lap of 1:49.096 to go comfortably fastest early on in the session, with team-mate Chilton 0.653 seconds further back, despite being the closest to Muller’s time. Muller’s time was an impressive seven tenths faster than he achieved on Friday, despite track temperatures being significantly cooler at the circuit.
Muller was on top throughout the session, improving his time with ten minutes to go to extend the gap to the rest of the pack. Behind Chilton, Honda’s Tiago Monteiro put in a quick late lap to go third, demoting local driver José María López to fourth as he excelled around his local circuit – despite making his WTCC début this weekend as a stand-in for Fredy Barth at Wiechers-Sport.
Norbert Michelisz was fifth fastest and the last driver to be within a second of Muller’s time. An impressive sixth overall was LADA’s James Thompson, ahead of the second works Honda of Gabriele Tarquini.
Completing the top ten were France’s Hugo Valente and Brits Rob Huff and Alex MacDowall.
Aside from López, the next best BMW driver was ROAL Motorsport’s Darryl O’Young in 11th. Regular BMW pace-setter Tom Coronel could only manage 13th fastest.
Although Monteiro was able to post the third-fastest time, the Portugese racer will still have to start from the back of the grid on Sunday after being forced to make an engine change.
Free practice two takes place at 16:00 BST (17:00 CEST; 12:00 ART)