Muller still unbeatable

In the first heat, Muller knocked over half a second off the best lap time in his first time round the 800m track, and further improved by two thousandths of a second in his second. With the heats reduced to two laps in hopes of retaining some ice in the mild temperatures, his total time of 1m33.716s was well ahead of second placed Jean-Pierre Malcher, driving a Nissan Micra.

Really enjoying himself on the ice, Muller repeated the operation in the second heat, winning easily with two fast, consistent laps to take an unbeatable lead in qualifying. James Ruffier, in the Opel Tigra, was in provisional second place after the two heats. Third in the first session, he improved to second place in the second heat.

'It's a good start, we'll have to see what happens in the other heat,' he said. 'But it's difficult out there, with lots of ice in some parts of the circuit and almost none in others. It's hard to judge what you need to do, and almost impossible to get it 100% correct. We're hoping to keep our third place in the championship, which is very important for us as a private team. It's good to show what you can do with a very modest budget.'

Double Sports Racing World Cup champion Emmanuel Collard made an impressive start in the Nissan Micra he shares with Malcher, coming in fourth in both heats.

'I like this circuit, there's almost no ice, so it's good for me!' he joked. 'Seriously, I like the ice, but the car goes better on this type of surface. And I feel more secure on the mix of ice and tarmac, so I drive better.'

Leading the Promotion class after two heats was Renault Clio driver Laurent Fouquet, with an excellent seventh time in the first heat followed by tenth in the second heat. Christophe Balas, who was fastest in practice, made a few mistakes and found himself well down the lists in the first session.

'I lost at least two seconds in various small mistakes,' he said. 'I'll have to think carefully before the next session.'

This obviously worked, as Balas set the 9th time overall, one tenth of a second faster than Fouquet. Opel's Jean-Philippe Dayraut, fastest in practice, had a more difficult time. Sixth in the first heat, he spun on his first lap of the second heat, choosing to abandon the rest of the run. Having played his joker, Dayraut will have to set a good time in tomorrow's third session in order to finish on the podium again.