Mikel Azcona continues qualifying dominance with Vila Real pole

BRC Racing’s Mikel Azcona continued his dominant run of performance in qualifying for the FIA TCR World Tour on the streets of Vila Real in Portugal, taking his third pole out of four events.

Hyundai’s Azcona saw off a challenge from Geely Cyan Racing’s Yann Ehlracher to secure the top spot by less than a tenth of a second, even though Ehrlacher had earlier topped Q1 with a lap which was more than half a second quicker than Azcona’s best at the time.

Spaniard Azcona ultimately went even faster in the all-important Q2 session to post a time of 1 minute 59.125 seconds, edging out Ehrlacher by 0.046 seconds and with it taking over the championship lead ahead of race day.

Ma Qing Hua put his Geely in third, two tenths back, ahead of team-mate Santiago Urrutia in fourth, as none of the Geely drivers had the pace for pole despite locking out the top four places in Q1.

SP Compétition duo Aurélien Comte and Viktor Andersson put their CUPRAs in fifth and sixth respectively, over a second off the pole pace, whilst Team Clairet’s Jimmy Clairet was seventh in his Audi.

ALM Motorsport’s Jenson Brickley was eighth in the sole Honda, with the top ten completed by BRC Racing’s Norbert Michelisz, who had to endure a broken driveshaft which was repaired within the session, and Cyan Racing’s Thed Björk, the latter lapping three seconds slower than his Q1 effort in an apparent attempt to go for the reverse-grid pole for race two.

SP Compétition’s Enzo Gianfratti was 11^th, completing those who posted a time, after Manuel Fernandes, who had put in a time good enough for Q2, failed to take part after collecting Vannin motorsport team-mate Stian Paulsen in Q1.

ALM Motorsport’s Mikael Karlsson just missed the cut off for Q2 and was 13^th, having hit the barriers after a lockup in Q1 and caused a red flag.

Norwegian racer Paulsen was 14^th, losing track time late in Q1 after going straight on at Turn 18. Team Clairet’s Mathieu Casalonga was the only other driver to post a time in 15^th.

Race one gets underway at 13:00 CEST (12:00 BST) on Sunday.

Q2 result

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	196		Mikel AZCONA	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N EV TCR	6	1:59.125	–
2	168		Yann EHRLACHER	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	6	1:59.171	0.046
3	155		MA Qing Hua	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	6	1:59.344	0.219
4	181		Santiago URRUTIA	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	6	1:59.439	0.314
5	107		Aurélien COMTE	SP Compétition	CUPRA Leon VZ TCR	6	2:00.453	1.328
6	10		Viktor ANDERSSON	SP Compétition	CUPRA Leon VZ TCR	7	2:00.985	1.860
7	121		Jimmy CLAIRET	Team Clairet Sport	Audi RS3 LMS TCR II	6	2:01.290	2.165
8	246		Jenson BRICKLEY	ALM Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR	6	2:01.748	2.623
9	105		Norbert MICHELISZ	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N EV TCR	5	2:02.986	3.861
10	111		Thed BJÖRK	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	5	2:03.032	3.907
11	419		Enzo GIANFRATTI	SP Compétition	CUPRA Leon VZ TCR	7	2:03.836	4.711
12	13		Manuel FERNANDES JR	Vannin Motorsport	Audi RS3 LMS TCR II	0	No time	N/A

Q1 result

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	168		Yann EHRLACHER	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	13	1:59.939	–
2	155		MA Qing Hua	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	9	1:59.949	0.010
3	181		Santiago URRUTIA	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	13	2:00.021	0.082
4	111		Thed BJÖRK	Geely Cyan Racing	Geely Preface TCR	14	2:00.145	0.206
5	196		Mikel AZCONA	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N EV TCR	6	2:00.586	0.647
6	105		Norbert MICHELISZ	BRC Hyundai N Squadra Corse	Hyundai Elantra N EV TCR	5	2:00.764	0.825
7	107		Aurélien COMTE	SP Compétition	CUPRA Leon VZ TCR	11	2:00.801	0.862
8	10		Viktor ANDERSSON	SP Compétition	CUPRA Leon VZ TCR	9	2:01.352	1.413
9	121		Jimmy CLAIRET	Team Clairet Sport	Audi RS3 LMS TCR II	12	2:01.863	1.924
10	246		Jenson BRICKLEY	ALM Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR	12	2:02.377	2.438
11	13		Manuel FERNANDES JR	Vannin Motorsport	Audi RS3 LMS TCR II	9	2:02.434	2.495
12	419		Enzo GIANFRATTI	SP Compétition	CUPRA Leon VZ TCR	14	2:02.999	3.060
13	148		Mikael KARLSSON	ALM Motorsport	Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR	12	2:03.074	3.135
14	34		Stian PAULSEN	Vannin Motorsport	Audi RS3 LMS TCR II	11	2:03.992	4.053
15	431		Mathieu CASALONGA	Team Clairet Sport	Audi RS3 LMS TCR II	13	2:09.808	9.869
16	59		Daniel TEIXEIRA	JT59 Racing Team	Hyundai Elantra N TCR	0	No time	N/A