Isidro Callejas stormed to his maiden TCR Europe pole position in qualifying at the Nürburgring after getting the better of Franco Griolami and Q1 pace setter Niels Langeveld.
The young Spanish driver ended the session just 0.037 seconds ahead of championship frontrunner Girolami after setting his 2 minute 6.751 seconds time in the last seconds of the second section of the session on Saturday morning.
His pole was in danger of being taken away by Langeveld, however the Dutch driver could only manage third quickest, and was a further 0.048 seconds behind Girolami.
Teddy Clairet ended the session fourth in the Team Clairet Sport Peugouet, with championship leader and fastest man in FP1 Mikel Azcona ending the session fourth despite a late attempt to move higher up the grid.
Tom Coronel ended Q2 in sixth, with Klim Gavrilov and Jáchym Galáš set to line up seventh and eighth for race one ahead of series returnee Viktor Davidovski.
Jack Young will start race two of the weekend on Sunday from pole position after he ended Q2 in tenth position.
Although Langeveld was the pace setter in Q1 for Sébastien Loeb Racing before ending Q2 in third, the team saw their three other drivers fail to make it through to the second section of qualifying.
Reigning champion Mehdi Bennani could only manage 13th quickest, while his teammate Sami Taoufik will start both races this weekend from 15th on the grid.
Felice Jelmini in the fourth of the quartet of Hyundai Elantra N TCR’s also struggled in Q1 and could only manage the 17th quickest time and will the start the race behind Jimmy Clairet who ended qualifying 16th fastest.
The rest of the grid was completed by Martin Ryba, Sylvain Pussier, Gilles Colombani and series debutant Łukasz Stolarczyk in his BTC Maszyny Audi.
Race one of the weekend is scheduled to get underway later today at 14:55 CEST (13:55 BST).
Q2 results
| POS | NO | NAT | DRIVER | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 26 |  |
Isidro CALLEJAS | Brutal Fish Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 4 | 2:06.751 | – |
| 2 | 72 |  |
Franco GIROLAMI | PSS Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 4 | 2:06.788 | 0.037 |
| 3 | 10 |  |
Niels LANGEVELD | Sébastien Loeb Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 4 | 2:06.836 | 0.085 |
| 4 | 20 |  |
Teddy CLAIRET | Team Clairet Sport | Peugeot 308 TCR | 4 | 2:07.210 | 0.459 |
| 5 | 96 | |
Mikel AZCONA | Volcano Motorsport | CUPRA Leon Competición TCR | 4 | 2:07.336 | 0.585 |
| 6 | 32 | |
Tom CORONEL | Comtoyou Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 3 | 2:07.430 | 0.679 |
| 7 | 14 |  |
Klim GAVRILOV | VRC-Team | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 4 | 2:07.674 | 0.923 |
| 8 | 24 |  |
Jáchym GALÁŠ | Janík Motorsport | Hyundai i30 N TCR | 5 | 2:07.789 | 1.038 |
| 9 | 110 |  |
Viktor DAVIDOVSKI | PSS Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 4 | 2:07.842 | 1.091 |
| 10 | 62 |  |
Jack YOUNG | Brutal Fish Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 4 | 2:07.904 | 1.153 |
| 11 | 162 |  |
Dušan BORKOVIĆ | Comtoyou Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 4 | 2:07.966 | 1.215 |
| 12 | 8 |  |
Nicolas BAERT | Comtoyou Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 3 | 2:08.050 | 1.299 |
Q1 results
| POS | NO | NAT | DRIVER | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 10 | |
Niels LANGEVELD | Sébastien Loeb Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 9 | 2:07.172 | – |
| 2 | 32 | |
Tom CORONEL | Comtoyou Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 8 | 2:07.444 | 0.272 |
| 3 | 162 | |
Dušan BORKOVIĆ | Comtoyou Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 8 | 2:07.526 | 0.354 |
| 4 | 96 | |
Mikel AZCONA | Volcano Motorsport | CUPRA Leon Competición TCR | 8 | 2:07.673 | 0.501 |
| 5 | 72 | |
Franco GIROLAMI | PSS Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 8 | 2:07.697 | 0.525 |
| 6 | 14 | |
Klim GAVRILOV | VRC-Team | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 8 | 2:07.710 | 0.538 |
| 7 | 110 | |
Viktor DAVIDOVSKI | PSS Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 8 | 2:07.774 | 0.602 |
| 8 | 20 | |
Teddy CLAIRET | Team Clairet Sport | Peugeot 308 TCR | 8 | 2:07.785 | 0.613 |
| 9 | 26 | |
Isidro CALLEJAS | Brutal Fish Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 6 | 2:07.838 | 0.666 |
| 10 | 8 | |
Nicolas BAERT | Comtoyou Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 8 | 2:07.971 | 0.799 |
| 11 | 62 | |
Jack YOUNG | Brutal Fish Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 7 | 2:08.065 | 0.893 |
| 12 | 24 | |
Jáchym GALÁŠ | Janík Motorsport | Hyundai i30 N TCR | 8 | 2:08.152 | 0.980 |
| 13 | 250 |  |
Mehdi BENNANI | Sébastien Loeb Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 9 | 2:08.172 | 1.000 |
| 14 | 70 | |
Mat’o HOMOLA | Janík Motorsport | Hyundai i30 N TCR | 9 | 2:08.198 | 1.026 |
| 15 | 25 | |
Sami TAOUFIK | Sébastien Loeb Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 8 | 2:08.210 | 1.038 |
| 16 | 21 | |
Jimmy CLAIRET | Team Clairet Sport | Peugeot 308 TCR | 8 | 2:08.292 | 1.120 |
| 17 | 44 |  |
Felice JELMINI | Sébastien Loeb Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 8 | 2:08.563 | 1.391 |
| 18 | 17 | |
Martin RYBA | Brutal Fish Racing Team | Honda Civic Type-R FK8 TCR | 8 | 2:08.878 | 1.706 |
| 19 | 77 | |
Sylvain PUSSIER | Team Clairet Sport | CUPRA TCR | 8 | 2:10.030 | 2.858 |
| 20 | 66 | |
Gilles COLOMBANI | Team Clairet Sport | CUPRA TCR | 9 | 2:10.954 | 3.782 |
| 21 | 53 |  |
Lukas STOLARCZYK | BTC Maszyny | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 8 | 2:11.649 | 4.477 |