WEC: Daniel Ricciardo Nogaro qualifying report

Daniel Ricciardo claims pole position for Sunday's WEC Formula Renault 2.0 season opener!

NOGARO - Australian driver Daniel Ricciardo has boosted his start of his 2008 campaign by claiming pole position for Sunday's Western European Cup (WEC) Formula Renault 2.0 first race of the season. The Red Bull Junior driver unsurprisingly emerged as fastest in today's 20-minute qualifying session after also having set the second fastest time in Friday's free practise session.

Unlike the pre-event test at the twisty Nogaro track earlier this week, both yesterday's free practise session and today's qualifying session were held in wet conditions. It did not bother Ricciardo though. The SG Formula driver showed impressive speed at both a dry and wet track this week. Friday's free practise session saw Ricciardo just missing out on P1 as he was marginally outpaced by Spanish driver Roberto Merhi in the final stage of the 60-minute session. Ricciardo turned things around though in today's qualifying session which decided the grid for tomorrow afternoon's season opener. By edging out Roberto Merhi and Richard Campollo, Australian's new rising star positioned himself in the best possible way for a prosperous start of the season.

DANIEL RICCIARDO: "I'm happy to be on pole for tomorrow's first race of the season. In qualifying I managed to get into a good rhythm straight away and set some fast laptimes early in the session. As the season is going to be long, the most important thing is to push hard to maximise our performance once again tomorrow. I realise life will be easier if I manage to pull a gap straight from the start, so that's exactly what I'm aiming at!"

-credit: dr