Coronel goes top in second practice
Tom Coronel was a surprise pace-setter in the second World Touring Car Championship free practice session at Okayama in Japan
Coronel, who took his only WTCC victory at Okayama two years ago, lapped the former Pacific Grand Prix venue in 1m38.943s on his first flying effort.
Despite this being almost a second slower than Augusto Farfus's morning time, it was still enough to leave the Dutchman quickest.
Like Coronel, Britain's Rob Huff had precious little running during the morning, but this did not stop the Chevrolet driver lapping 0.036 seconds slower to go second.
Tiago Monteiro was the best of the SEAT drivers, the Portuguese putting his SR-Sport Leon TDI third ahead of Farfus's BMW and Robert Dahlgren's Polestar Volvo.
Alain Menu (Chevrolet) was sixth with Franz Engstler surprisingly next up in his Team Engstler BMW. The German was the best of the independent competitors.
It was a tough session for championship leader Yvan Muller, who ended up ninth, one spot behind the Zengo Dension SEAT of Norbert Michelisz.
Having just left the pits midway through the session, the world championship leader's left-rear wheel tried to depart his Chevrolet, although Muller was able to nurse the car back to the pits without losing the offending item.
He stayed there for 10 minutes while the RML mechanics checked out his suspension, but returned to the track for one final flying lap during the dying minutes.
Former British Touring Car champion Colin Turkington completed the top 10 in his WSR BMW with Muller's title rivals Gabriele Tarquini (SR-Sport SEAT) and Andy Priaulx (BMW) next up.
The session was largely incident-free although Yoshihiro Ito did spin his Engstler BMW at the Hobbs hairpin early on.
Pos Driver Car Time Gap 1. Tom Coronel SEAT 1m38.943s 2. Rob Huff Chevrolet 1m38.979s + 0.036s 3. Tiago Monteiro SEAT 1m39.105s + 0.162s 4. Augusto Farfus BMW 1m39.110s + 0.167s 5. Robert Dahlgren Volvo 1m39.208s + 0.265s 6. Alain Menu Chevrolet 1m39.421s + 0.478s 7. Franz Engstler BMW 1m39.443s + 0.500s 8. Norbert Michelisz SEAT 1m39.455s + 0.512s 9. Yvan Muller Chevrolet 1m39.567s + 0.624s 10. Colin Turkington BMW 1m39.579s + 0.636s 11. Gabriele Tarquini SEAT 1m39.653s + 0.710s 12. Andy Priaulx BMW 1m39.660s + 0.717s 13. Michel Nykjaer SEAT 1m39.722s + 0.779s 14. Fredy Barth SEAT 1m39.818s + 0.875s 15. Michael Rossi SEAT 1m39.916s + 0.973s 16. Darryl O'Young Chevrolet 1m40.230s + 1.287s 17. Andrei Romanov BMW 1m40.410s + 1.467s 18. Stefano D'Aste BMW 1m40.473s + 1.530s 19. Yukinori Taniguchi Chevrolet 1m40.622s + 1.679s 20. Kristian Poulsen BMW 1m40.635s + 1.692s 21. Sergio Hernandez BMW 1m40.706s + 1.763s 22. Mehdi Bennani BMW 1m40.801s + 1.858s 23. Yoshihiro Ito BMW 1m40.913s + 1.970s 24. Masataka Yanagida BMW 1m42.080s + 3.137s 25. Nobuteru Taniguchi BMW 1m42.160s + 3.217s 26. Henry Ho BMW 1m42.755s + 3.812s 27. Kevin Chen BMW 1m42.824s + 3.881s
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