Norbert Michelisz has described qualifying on Pole Position for the first time in the Zengő Motorsport Honda Civic as a dream as the Hungarian set the fastest time at Suzuka.
For Michelisz, it marked the second time he had qualified on Pole Position in his World Touring Car Championship career – his first came in Slovakia last year – and Michelisz secured the position on his first run.
The 20 minute qualifying session saw Michelisz set the 2nd fastest time of the session – only bettered by Yvan Muller in the RML Chevrolet Cruze.
Qualifying two saw Michelisz blitz the timing screens to secure his second career Pole Position ahead of race 199 in the history of the World Touring Car Championship.
“For me it is like a dream today,” said Michelisz after qualifying.
“I told my Zengő Motorsport team after that lap that there was no point in going out again as I knew it was a near perfect lap for me and perhaps I could find maybe 1/1000th of a second more but nothing else so we have saved tyres for the race. It will be an honour for me to start on the pole position for Honda at their home circuit,” added the 27 year old.
Honda’s Large Project leader Daisuke Horiuchi added that Michelisz’s pole lap had been made possible by data collected at the previous round at Sonoma, and that he blieves the manufacturer’s 2013 engine has now reached its peak.
“The result today is the accumulation of one year of managing the engine since it ran for the first time here at Suzuka in 2012,” said Horiuchi. “Today we used basically the same mapping that proved a winner at Sonoma which has been a step by step progess. This is the ultimate performance from this engine and we have gained so much data that will be important for the 2014 engines.”