Martin Xie takes pole on CTCC debut at Zhuhai
Chang’an Ford FRD team’s new driver Martin Xie Xin Zhe has taken pole position for the first round of the 2013 China Touring Car Championship at the Zhuhai International Circuit.
The rookie’s team-mates Jiang Tengyi, Rainey He and Andy Yan qualified fourth, fifth and eighth respectively.
Shanghai VW 333 Racing’s Wang Rue and Gao Hua Yang qualified second and third, with the same lap time of 1:48.386. Reigning champion Han Han suffered from mechanical problems and could not set a time, which places him in ninth position.
The grid for the first round of the 2013 CTCC season has been hit my a number of issues. Privateer team ASR da Marco have not entered this race, and G Racing only prepared one of their Chevrolet Cruze 1.6Ts for Kenneth Look, who went on to qualify in seventh place.
The restructured Kia 778 Autosport team have not completed mandatory documentation for their new K2 cars which has prevented them from competing in the race this weekend.
The CTCC Super Production race will be held at 13:00 local time on Sunday.
