Franco Girolami puts his Audi on pole in TCR Europe qualifying at Spa

Comtoyou Racing’s Franco Girolami qualified his Audi on pole position for the opening TCR Europe race at Spa-Francorchamps, beating Volcano Motorsport’s Klim Gavrilov by three tenths of a second.

Girolami posted the fastest lap of the weekend thus far in the all-important Q2 session, lapping the Belgian circuit in 2 minutes 30.110 seconds, giving him a first pole of the year and extending his championship lead to 23 points over Tom Coronel.

The Argentine is well-placed for victory later in the day – Audi cars have historically been strong at Spa, with victories in 2018 for Jean-Karl Vernay and 2019 for Gilles Magnus, before recent years saw domination from CUPRA and Mikel Azcona.

Due to the long lap, drivers effectively only completed one flying lap, taking into account the time taken to complete an out and in lap ruling out tyre swapping for two fast runs. Thus Girolami’s first time, posted on his second lap, stood throughout Q2.

Gavrilov put his CUPRA in second, the Russian having crept up the timesheets in second practice on Friday, after being outside the top ten earlier in the day. It marks Gavrilov’s first-ever race one front-row qualifying performance in the series.

Isidro Callejas was directly behind his team-mate in third, just over half a second off the pace, the Spaniard ahead of the best-ranked Hyundai of Nicola Baldan in fourth.

Italian Felice Jelmini followed directly behind his compatriot and Target Competition team-mate in fifth, with Josh Files completing the trio of Target Hyundai Elantras in sixth.

Northern Irishman Jack Young, who had been quickest in Friday’s second practice session, was the best-placed Honda driver in seventh, just 0.019 seconds ahead of the eighth-placed Hyundai Elantra of Janík Motorsport’s Mat’o Homola.

The top ten was completed by first practice pace-setter Coronel in his Audi and Janík’s Jáchym Galáš, thus giving the pair a front row start for the reverse-grid second race, with Galáš on pole position.

Sébastien Loeb Racing’s John Filippi just missed out on the reverse-grid pole and was 11^th, almost a second and a half off the pace, with Brutal Fish Racing’s Pepe Oriola in 12^th.

Just missing out on progressing beyond Q1 was Mike Halder, the German two tenths of a second shy of continuing into Q2, leaving him in 13^th.

Rookie Marco Butti was 14^th quickest on his début in the series with Élite Motorsport by Comtoyou Racing, ahead of stable-mate Viktor Davidovski in 15^th.

Whilst all three of the RC2 Junior Team entries posted times, they will occupy the tenth and 11^th rows of the grid of 22 cars. Rubén Fernández was just 19^th in his new-spec Audi as the best of the trio.

Race one is scheduled to get underway at 15:00 CEST (14:00 BST) and will be live-streamed on YouTube.

Q2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	72		Franco GIROLAMI	Comtoyou Racing	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	3	2:30.110	–
2	14		Klim GAVRILOV	Volcano Motorsport	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	3	2:30.441	0.331
3	26		Isidro CALLEJAS	Volcano Motorsport	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	3	2:30.630	0.520
4	8		Nicola BALDAN	Target Competition	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	4	2:30.659	0.549
5	44		Felice JELMINI	Target Competition	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	4	2:30.749	0.639
6	99		Josh FILES	Target Motorsport	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	4	2:30.854	0.744
7	62		Jack YOUNG	Halder Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	4	2:30.874	0.764
8	70		Mat’o HOMOLA	Janík Motorsport	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	4	2:30.983	0.783
9	33		Tom CORONEL	Comtoyou Racing	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	3	2:31.215	1.105
10	24		Jáchym GALÁŠ	Janík Motorsport	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	4	2:31.391	1.281
11	27		John FILIPPI	Sébastien Loeb Racing – Bardahl Team	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	3	2:31.604	1.494
12	74		Pepe ORIOLA	Brutal Fish Racing Team	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	4	2:32.539	2.429

Q1 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	44		Felice JELMINI	Target Competition	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	6	2:30.629	–
2	62		Jack YOUNG	Halder Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	6	2:30.706	0.077
3	8		Nicola BALDAN	Target Competition	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	7	2:30.711	0.082
4	26		Isidro CALLEJAS	Volcano Motorsport	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	7	2:30.938	0.309
5	99		Josh FILES	Target Motorsport	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	8	2:30.940	0.311
6	14		Klim GAVRILOV	Volcano Motorsport	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	6	2:30.992	0.363
7	33		Tom CORONEL	Comtoyou Racing	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	4	2:31.002	0.373
8	72		Franco GIROLAMI	Comtoyou Racing	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	5	2:31.104	0.475
9	24		Jáchym GALÁŠ	Janík Motorsport	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	7	2:31.278	0.649
10	74		Pepe ORIOLA	Brutal Fish Racing Team	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	6	2:31.346	0.717
11	27		John FILIPPI	Sébastien Loeb Racing – Bardahl Team	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	8	2:31.355	0.726
12	70		Mat’o HOMOLA	Janík Motorsport	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	7	2:31.375	0.746
13	7		Mike HALDER	Halder Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	6	2:31.571	0.942
14	111		Marco BUTTI	Élite Motorsport by Comtoyou	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	8	2:31.854	1.225
15	110		Viktor DAVIDOVSKI	Comtoyou Racing	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	7	2:32.041	1.412
16	16		Evgenii LEONOV	Volcano Motorsport	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	8	2:32.391	1.762
17	3		Giacomo GHERMANDI	Lema Racing	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	8	2:32.572	1.943
18	53		Michelle HALDER	Halder Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	7	2:32.580	1.951
19	12		Rubén FERNÁNDEZ Gil	RC2 Junior Team	Audi RS3 LMS TCR 2021	8	2:33.048	2.419
20	19		Felipe FERNÁNDEZ Gil	RC2 Junior Team	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	7	2:33.417	2.788
21	17		Martin RYBA	Brutal Fish Racing Team	Honda Civic Type-R FK7 TCR	8	2:33.746	3.117
22	37		Sergio LÓPEZ	RC2 Junior Team	CUPRA Leon Competición TCR	8	2:33.850	3.221
23	46		Caren BURTON	Burton Racing	Peugeot 308 TCR	0	Withdrawn	N/A