Macau: Advantage Muller
Jorg Muller took what appeared to be a fairly straightforward provisional pole position during first qualifying for this weekend's SJM Macau Guia Race as he edged out his BMW Team Germany team-mate Dirk Muller by 1.033 seconds
The German, who was at the centre of a controversial incident during last year's Guia race, admitted that there was plenty of work to do with his car despite his speed.
"The car is still not perfect," he said. "But when you are fastest it is always quite difficult not to be happy. It was hard out there trying to find some free space on the track and I think I still have a little bit of work to do on the set-up."
Dirk Muller, who is racing in Macau for the first time, had a relatively untroubled time to set the second fastest time, ahead of Sweden's Rickard Rydell in the Seat.
Briton Andy Priaulx, who had been quickest in the morning's free practice session, failed to get a completely clear lap during qualifying and was caught up in an incident with Tom Coronel in the closing minutes.
"I was slipstreaming Tom and Dirk Muller down the main straight and as we came to brake my foot got caught half on the throttle," he said. "So I braked too late and I had a choice to hit them both or tap Tom into a spin. It was a bit of a nightmare but I didn't do it on purpose."
Coronel was not too bothered by his clash with Priaulx - although was ruing the fact that he had lost the time gained slipstreaming Dirk Muller. "I must have been about half a second quicker up to that point," he said.
Coronel's team-mate Duncan Huisman, chasing a fourth straight victory in the Guia race this weekend, confessed that his car will need some set-up changes ahead of Friday's second qualifying session. There was one red flag during the session after Jordi Gene crashed into the stationary car of Richard Meins and blocked the track.
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