Paul Ricard WTCC: Citroen's Yvan Muller, Ma Qing Hua lead practice

Muller was the quickest in the first session and his first two laps set the benchmark, as his first flying lap of 1m31.490 sent him top, before he improved to a 1m30.950s on the following tour.

Sebastien Loeb proved to be the nearest challenger to Muller early in the session, as their champion team-mate Jose Maria Lopez resided in the pits after catching a bollard on a corner's exit.

The Argentinian's Citroen team set about repairing an apparent damaged headlight before sending him back out on track and he managed to take second behind Muller.

Lopez's pace deserted him in a second session that featured several drivers failing to stay within track limits and, the Argentinian joined their ranks late on with a mistake on a fast lap.

Ma was his target, as track times tumbled late on and helped the Chinese driver move to first place with his time of 1m30.029s.

Lopez had struggled before his penultimate lap and was a lowly 10th, but after setting two blistering sector times, he ran wide and lost significant time, leaving him down in 11th at the session's end.

He wasn't the only frontrunner to struggle, as the morning pacesetter Muller finished eighth behind Loeb and ahead of Tiago Monteiro, the Portuguese driver third fastest in the earlier running for Honda.

Their troubles meant Ma went unchallenged in the final minutes ahead of Gregoire Demoustier, the best placed independent in both sessions in the Craft-Bamboo Chevrolet showing his strongest WTCC form yet at home. Tom Coronel completed the top three.

Those closing seconds also featured the track limit problems hitting their crescendo with a black flag for Stefano D'Aste and an off for John Filippi's Chevrolet.

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