Estoril pole for Ekstrom

Ekstrom was in imperious form once again at Estoril, his only error on his Super Pole lap coming at Turn 1 as he hadn't generated sufficient heat in his brakes. Once on song, however, he blitzed the rest of the lap to beat Gary Paffett of Mercedes by 0.222secs.

"We have been strong all day long," said Ekstrom. "After the first corner it was almost the perfect lap, and it's going to be important to start from the front tomorrow."

Paffett said: "I had a perfect weekend at Hockenheim, and it's good to continue that here. We weren't that quick yesterday, but made a lot of changes overnight and we've been on the pace all day."

Timo Scheider posted Opel's best qualifying lap of the season so far to grab third in his Vectra: "We changed something in the rear axle between pre-qualifying to Super Pole and it was immediately better. I didn't expect a lap quite that quick, so I'm really happy about that."

Audi's one-lap specialist Martin Tomczyk was true to form, posting the fourth fastest time despite a couple of ragged moments, his final sector in particular holding him back. Tom Kristensen was fifth quickest, ahead of Mercedes aces Christijan Albers and Bernd Schneider. Formula 1 veterans Heinz-Harald Frentzen, who was very quick in the final sector, and Jean Alesi were next up, with Christian Abt (Audi) completing the top 10.

Britain's Peter Dumbreck just missed out on the Super Pole and will start 11th in his Opel.



Mattias Ekstrom, Audi A4, 1m34.039s
Gary Paffett, Mercedes C-Class, 1m34.261s
Timo Scheider, Opel Vectra GTS, 1m34.512s
Martin Tomczyk, Audi A4, 1m34.621s
Tom Kristensen, Audi A4, 1m34.677s
Christijan Albers, Mercedes C-Class, 1m34.700s
Bernd Schneider, Mercedes C-Class, 1m34.745s
Heinz-Harald Frentzen, Opel Vectra GTS, 1m34.873s
Jean Alesi, Mercedes C-Class, 1m34.907s
Christian Abt, Audi A4, 1m35.097s