Okayama: Series qualifying report

TARQUINI CLAIMS HIS FIFTH POLE OF THE SEASON

Gabriele Tarquini took his third consecutive pole with a storming lap of 1:37.666 making it five poles this season. Andy Priaulx qualified second with Jorg Muller third. The top three times were split by a mere 0.060 of a second. Title contenders Farfus and Yvan Muller will line up fifth and seventh respectively.

Q1 - The top ten places remained relatively stable among the front runners with all five SEAT Sport cars setting competitive times along with the BMW cars of Priaulx, Muller and Farfus. The final two places were all to play for and it was Huff and Menu of Chevrolet who snapped them up. Hernandez missed Q2 by 0.143 of a second taking 11th position on the grid with Coronel taking the Independent pole (12th overall).Thompson of LADA Sport was denied a Q2 spot by 0.206 and will line up 13th tomorrow.

Japanese drivers Nobuteru Taniguchi and Seiji Ara had a respectable qualifying. The former was just three tenths off the pace of his team-mate Porteiro who was 15th overall, while Ara's best lap was just two tenths off that of Wiechers-Sport companion D'Aste.

Q2 - Throughout qualifying the BMW cars looked strong, therefore it was something of a surprise when Tarquini's last lap shot him to the top of the timesheet. Until then provisional pole was held by Muller who was demoted to third after Priaulx squeezed into second place but fell 0.050 seconds shy of being pole-worthy.

Rydell took the fourth spot with Gene sixth, Monteiro eighth, Huff ninth and Menu tenth. All of the Q2 competitors set their best times on their last laps making for a suspense-filled couple of minutes.

-credit: wtcc