Citroën’s José María López was fastest in a sodden first World Touring Car Championship practice session at the Hungaroring, ahead of the Hondas of Gabriele Tarquini and Tiago Monteiro.
The 2014 champion set his time midway through the half-hour session, which had earlier been stopped after a hefty crash for team-mate Sébastien Loeb early in the session.
Loeb went off under braking at Turn 1 at the start of his first full lap of the circuit, heading straight into the tyre wall at the end of the runoff area and wrecking his left-front suspension in the process, with his team facing an uphill struggle to prepare his car in time for the second session.
With Loeb’s C-Elysee finally placed recovered, the session resumed after a 15-minute delay and López immediately set the fastest time ahead of the third Citroën of Yvan Muller, with an early benchmark time of 2:14.349s bettered only by Tarquini and Monteiro late on in practice.
López went quicker once more, however, at the halfway stage, but blew that time away with his final lap of the session, with his pace-setting effort of 2:11.930s putting him 1.597s clear of Tarquini, who moved into second with a late improvement of his own.
Muller ended the session fourth behind Monteiro, ahead of home favourite Norbert Michelisz who had a quiet but productive run to set the fifth-fastest time.
Ma Qing Hua was sixth ahead of Stefano D’Aste – the Italian racking up more laps than anyone else in the field despite a number of issues at Turn 5 – with Mehdi Bennani and the two ROAL Motorsport Chevrolet Cruzes of Tom Chilton and Tom Coronel completing the top ten.
Second practice is set to get underway at 10:30 BST.
Session results
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 37 | José María LÓPEZ |  |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 11 | 2:11.930 | 0.000 | |
| 2 | 2 | Gabriele TARQUINI |  |
Castrol Honda WTC Team | Honda Civic WTCC | 10 | 2:13.527 | 1.597 | |
| 3 | 18 | Tiago MONTEIRO |  |
Castrol Honda WTC Team | Honda Civic WTCC | 9 | 2:14.249 | 2.319 | |
| 4 | 68 | Yvan MULLER |  |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 10 | 2:14.485 | 2.555 | |
| 5 | 5 | Y | Norbert MICHELISZ |  |
Zengő Motorsport | Honda Civic WTCC | 11 | 2:15.029 | 3.099 |
| 6 | 33 | MA Qing Hua |  |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 11 | 2:15.426 | 3.496 | |
| 7 | 26 | Y | Stefano D’ASTE | |
ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 13 | 2:15.430 | 3.500 |
| 8 | 25 | Y | Mehdi BENNANI |  |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 11 | 2:16.140 | 4.210 |
| 9 | 3 | Y | Tom CHILTON |  |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 10 | 2:16.590 | 4.660 |
| 10 | 4 | Y | Tom CORONEL |  |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 9 | 2:17.082 | 5.152 |
| 11 | 7 | Y | Hugo VALENTE | |
Campos Racing | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 9 | 2:17.305 | 5.375 |
| 12 | 15 | James THOMPSON | |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 8 | 2:18.084 | 6.154 | |
| 13 | 12 | Rob HUFF | |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 4 | 2:18.133 | 6.203 | |
| 14 | 14 | Mikhail KOZLOVSKIY |  |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 7 | 2:18.477 | 6.547 | |
| 15 | 27 | Y | John FILIPPI | |
Campos Racing | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 10 | 2:18.856 | 6.926 |
| 16 | 11 | Y | Grégoire DEMOUSTIER | |
Craft-Bamboo Racing | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 10 | 2:20.275 | 8.345 |
| 17 | 9 | Sébastien LOEB | |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 1 | No time | N/A |