RML’s Yvan Muller moved to the top of the timesheets in second free practice for the World Touring Car Championship at Suzuka, beating fellow Chevrolet driver Alex MacDowall to the top time.
Click here for the full second practice times.
A hotter session than the morning’s earlier first practice saw lap times slightly slower around the Suzuka East circuit, with Muller clocking a time of 54.076 seconds to go two tenths faster than bamboo-engineering’s MacDowall.
Norbert Michelisz was the top Honda driver in third, putting his Zengő Motorsport Civic just 0.006 seconds ahead of the Works’ JAS car of Gabriele Tarquini in fourth.
An impressive fifth fastest was Campos Racing’s Fernando Monje, who was a further 0.006 seconds back and the top SEAT driver. Münnich Motorsport’s Rob Huff was sixth fastest, ahead of team-mate Marc Basseng.
Tom Chilton put his RML Chevrolet eighth fastest, 0.264 seconds off his team-mate,despite an incident during the session where Chilton was forced to drive off the circuit to avoid team-mate Muller. Chilton finished the session ahead of Honda’s morning pace-setter Tiago Monteiro in ninth.
Charles Kaki Ng completed the top ten for Liqui Moly Team Engstler and was the fastest BMW driver, two tenths faster than 14th-placed Darryl O’Young.
Having been an impressive second fastest in first practice, Takuya Izawa again ended the session as the top Japanese driver and fastest of all entrants in the EuroSport Asia Trophy, albeit down in 16th position.
ROAL Motorsport’s Tom Coronel, who has won at the Suzuka circuit in the past, struggled for pace during the session and ended the session in 17th.
Qualifying takes place at 15:30 JST (07:30 BST; 08:30 CEST).