Néstor Girolami heads Münnich 1-2 in red-flag interrupted Pau qualifying

Néstor Girolami beat Münnich Motorsport team-mate Esteban Guerrieri to pole position in a red-flag interrupted FIA World Touring Car Cup qualifying session on the streets of Pau in France.

After the Lynk & Co 03 of Santiago Urrutia had topped the times in both of the earlier free practice sessions, much was expected of the Cyan Racing cars come qualifying.

However, in the first part of the session, Q1, it was Hyundai’s Mikel Azcona who posted the top time, edging out the Honda of Girolami, as Urrutia narrowly avoided missing out on progressing with the 12^th fastest time.

Q2 was little more than a few minutes old when Thed Björk heavily crashed his car at the final chicane, the Cyan Racing driver having clipped the wall on the inside before bouncing hard into the barriers on the outside.

That required a one-hour stoppage as officials worked to repair the safety barrier, which had been left with a gaping hole in it after the Swede’s shunt.

When track action resumed at just past seven in the evening, Yvan Muller and team-mate Yann Ehrlacher held the early advantage.

But as drivers finally put in flying laps, the two dropped down the order, neither able to improve their times.

Muller dropped to fourth and just stayed in to progress to Q3, but a clearly disappointed Ehrlacher slipped to sixth, ending up four tenths from the Q2 pace.

In Q3, Guerrieri opted to go first and posted a benchmark time which was marginally slowe than his Q2 effort.

Girolami immediately followed and went a tenth and a half quicker with a time of 1 minute 19.783 seconds, which proved to be the best time, giving the Argentine a fourth WTCR pole position of his career.

Muller was the closest challenger to the Hondas in third, over half a second adrift, whilst Audi’s Nathanaël Berthon – whose late improvement to second in Q2 dumped Ehrlacher out of Q3 – could only manage fourth.

Cyan Racing’s Ma Qing Hua was fifth, over a second off the pace after the Chinese ace had to save two huge slides on his single flying lap.

Ehrlacher’s Uruguayan team-mate Santiago Urrutia was equally frustrated, managing only seventh having set the benchmark prior to the session.

Azcona was the best of the BRC Racing Hyundai drivers in eighth, with Engstler Motorsport’s Attila Tassi and Hyundai’s Norbert Michelisz completing the top ten, he latter despite a brush with the barriers early on in the restarted Q2 which required a visit to the pits for hasty tape repairs.

That means Michelisz will start the partially-reversed second race from pole position, with Tassi for company on the front row of the grid.

As may have been predicted after their lack of pre-season testing, neither Zengő Motorsport CUPRA progressed beyond Q1, with Rob Huff only just missing the cut in 13^th.

The returning Mehdi Bennani was 14^th in his Comtoyou Racing Audi, ahead of the slowest Honda of Team Engstler’s Tiago Monteiro in 15^th, the Portuguese actually being one of only four drivers with previous touring car experience of the circuit.

Comtoyou Racing’s Tom Coronel was 16^th, ahead of Zengő’s Dániel Nagy and wildcard entry Eric Cayrolle in 18^th at the bottom of the times.

Race one is scheduled to get underway at 13:10 CEST (12:10 BST) on Sunday.

Q3 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	29		Néstor GIROLAMI	ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport	Honda Civic TCR	3	1:19.783	–
2	86		Esteban GUERRIERI	ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport	Honda Civic TCR	3	1:19.937	0.154
3	100		Yvan MULLER	Cyan Racing Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	3	1:20.361	0.578
4	17		Nathanaël BERTHON	COMTOYOU DHL TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	3	1:20.629	0.846
5	55		MA Qing Hua	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	3	1:20.901	1.118

Q2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	86		Esteban GUERRIERI	ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport	Honda Civic TCR	8	1:19.851	–
2	17		Nathanaël BERTHON	COMTOYOU DHL TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	9	1:20.118	0.267
3	29		Néstor GIROLAMI	ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport	Honda Civic TCR	9	1:20.148	0.297
4	100		Yvan MULLER	Cyan Racing Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	6	1:20.226	0.375
5	55		MA Qing Hua	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	8	1:20.261	0.410
6	68		Yann EHRLACHER	Cyan Racing Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	6	1:20.264	0.413
7	12		Santiago URRUTIA	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	7	1:20.273	0.422
8	96		Mikel AZCONA	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	8	1:20.288	0.437
9	9		Attila TASSI	Liqui MolyTeam Engstler	Honda Civic TCR	7	1:20.373	0.522
10	5		Norbert MICHELISZ	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	7	1:20.419	0.568
11	16		Gilles MAGNUS	COMTOYOU TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	8	1:20.616	0.765
12	11		Thed BJÖRK	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	2	No time	N/A

Q1 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	96		Mikel AZCONA	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	15	1:20.178	–
2	29		Néstor GIROLAMI	ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport	Honda Civic TCR	13	1:20.187	0.009
3	16		Gilles MAGNUS	COMTOYOU TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	12	1:20.192	0.014
4	86		Esteban GUERRIERI	ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport	Honda Civic TCR	12	1:20.242	0.064
5	55		MA Qing Hua	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	10	1:20.318	0.140
6	11		Thed BJÖRK	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	10	1:20.326	0.148
7	17		Nathanaël BERTHON	COMTOYOU DHL TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	12	1:20.370	0.192
8	5		Norbert MICHELISZ	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	14	1:20.400	0.222
9	100		Yvan MULLER	Cyan Racing Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	10	1:20.448	0.270
10	68		Yann EHRLACHER	Cyan Racing Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	9	1:20.502	0.324
11	9		Attila TASSI	Liqui MolyTeam Engstler	Honda Civic TCR	13	1:20.522	0.344
12	12		Santiago URRUTIA	Cyan Performance Lynk & Co	Lynk & Co 03 TCR	11	1:20.524	0.346
13	79		Rob HUFF	ZENGÖ MOTORSPORT SERVICES KFT	Cupra Leon Competicion TCR	16	1:20.587	0.409
14	25		Mehdi BENNANI	COMTOYOU TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	17	1:20.707	0.529
15	18		Tiago MONTEIRO	Liqui MolyTeam Engstler	Honda Civic TCR	17	1:20.832	0.654
16	33		Tom CORONEL	COMTOYOU DHL TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	14	1:20.855	0.677
17	99		Dániel NAGY	ZENGÖ MOTORSPORT SERVICES KFT	Cupra Leon Competicion TCR	17	1:21.052	0.874
18	64		Eric CAYROLLE	COMTOYOU TEAM AUDI SPORT	Audi RS3 LMS	16	1:21.857	1.679