Chevrolet blitzes final practice
Chevrolet secured a firm control on proceedings in second free practice at Curitiba's opening World Touring Car Championship round of 2011
Reigning world champion Yvan Muller led a formidable Cruze 1-2-3-4 in the final half hour session ahead of this afternoon's qualifying.
The Frenchman demoted Rob Huff from P1 with eight minutes of track time remaining, and maintained a 0.141 seconds advantage over the Briton to the chequered flag. Muller's lap was some 1.2s faster than Huff's 2010 pole position time.
Guest driver Caca Bueno, who is also competing in his regular Brazilian Stock Car championship this weekend, demonstrated no ill-effects from his constant car hopping to edge out Alain Menu for third spot.
Gabriele Tarquini was best of the rest in his SUNRED SEAT Leon, albeit over a second slower than Muller's effort.
A last gasp lap promoted Franz Engstler to sixth. The German led a trio of BMWs to finish as the highest-placed independent driver.
Conditions had dried considerably since this morning's first practice. The only off-track incident of note befell the youngest driver in the field, 16-year-old Pepe Oriola. The SUNRED driver careered through one of Curitiba's gravel traps, but avoided sustaining any damage to his Leon.
Hong Kong's Marchy Lee parked his KK Motorsport BMW by the pitlane exit with technical problems after completing just two laps.
Pos Driver Team/Car Time Gap 1. Yvan Muller Chevrolet 1m22.455s 2. Rob Huff Chevrolet 1m22.596s + 0.141s 3. Carlos Bueno Chevrolet 1m22.654s + 0.199s 4. Alain Menu Chevrolet 1m22.796s + 0.341s 5. Gabriele Tarquini SUNRED SEAT 1m23.612s + 1.157s 6. Franz Engstler Engstler BMW 1m23.619s + 1.164s 7. Tom Coronel ROAL BMW 1m23.626s + 1.171s 8. Kristian Poulsen Engstler BMW 1m23.758s + 1.303s 9. Tiago Monteiro SUNRED SEAT 1m23.783s + 1.328s 10. Fredy Barth SUNRED SEAT 1m23.998s + 1.543s 11. Michel Nykjaer SUNRED SEAT 1m24.066s + 1.611s 12. Mehdi Bennani Proteam BMW 1m24.609s + 2.154s 13. Darryl O'Young bamboo Chevrolet 1m24.696s + 2.241s 14. Pepe Oriola SUNRED SEAT 1m24.729s + 2.274s 15. Javier Villa Proteam BMW 1m25.014s + 2.559s 16. Robert Dahlgren Polestar Volvo 1m25.097s + 2.642s 17. Aleksei Dudukalo SUNRED SEAT 1m25.451s + 2.996s 18. Yukinori Taniguchi bamboo Chevrolet 1m25.719s + 3.264s 19. Fabio Fabiani Proteam BMW 1m31.260s + 8.805s 20. Marchy Lee KK BMW 1m42.852s + 20.397s
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