Jose Maria Lopez fastest in first session of 2016 WTCC
Double world champion Jose Maria Lopez was fastest in the first World Touring Car Championship testing session of the year at a moist Paul Ricard
Lopez went fastest in the opening minutes of the half-hour session and was trailed by Citroen team-mate Yvan Muller, while Honda's Norbert Michelisz was third-fastest.
The Citroen drivers were the first to take to the circuit in their C-Elysees, and were quickly on the pace as Muller went fastest with an opening effort of 1m45.414s.
But Lopez went quicker on the next tour, finishing with an effort of 1m44.077s.
He remained unheaded from there, despite spinning in the rain and Muller improving to within half a second of his benchmark in the final five minutes of the session.
All three of Honda's drivers enjoyed a low-key session, but Michelisz jumped up to the third in the final minute with an effort of 1m44.725s.
That displaced Mehdi Bennani, the best-placed of the Sebastien Loeb Racing satellite Citroen entries, who was fourth-fastest ahead of team-mate Tom Chilton.
ROAL Motorsport's Tom Coronel was sixth ahead of Nick Catsburg, who finished the session fastest of the Lada drivers, while Tiago Monteiro was eighth.
Rob Huff was 12th in the third factory Honda.
Fredrik Ekblom and Thed Bjork were 14th and 15th respectively in their Volvo S60 Polestars on the manufacturer's return to the WTCC.
Neither of Zengo Motorsport's new recruits set a time, with Ferenc Ficza and Daniel Nagy staying in the pits for the entirety of the session.
TEST SESSION TIMES
Pos | Driver | Team | Car | Gap | Laps |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | Jose Maria Lopez | Citroen Racing | Citroen | 1m44.077s | 13 |
2 | Yvan Muller | Citroen Racing | Citroen | 0.476s | 12 |
3 | Norbert Michelisz | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 0.648s | 11 |
4 | Mehdi Bennani | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 0.749s | 11 |
5 | Tom Chilton | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 0.772s | 12 |
6 | Tom Coronel | ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet | 1.360s | 10 |
7 | Nicky Catsburg | LADA Sport | Lada | 1.697s | 15 |
8 | Tiago Monteiro | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 1.779s | 13 |
9 | Gabriele Tarquini | LADA Sport | Lada | 1.797s | 11 |
10 | Gregoire Demoustier | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 2.251s | 11 |
11 | Hugo Valente | LADA Sport | Lada | 3.229s | 14 |
12 | Rob Huff | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 3.584s | 13 |
13 | John Filippi | Campos Racing | Chevrolet | 4.400s | 12 |
14 | Fredrik Ekblom | Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo | 5.490s | 11 |
15 | Thed Bjork | Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo | 5.945s | 11 |
16 | Rene Munnich | Munnich Motorsport | Chevrolet | 8.743s | 11 |
- | Ferenc Ficza | Zengo Motorsport | Honda | - | 0 |
- | Daniel Nagy | Zengo Motorsport | Honda | - | 0 |
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