Ma Qing Hua fastest by half a second in TCR World Tour practice one at Hungaroring
Cyan Racing’s Ma Qing Hua left it late to go fastest in the TCR World Tour and TCR Europe’s first practice at the Hungaroring.
It was Comtoyou Racing’s Rob huff who set the pace at first with a 1:55.157, then eight minutes into the half-hour session Cyan Racing’s Yann Ehrlacher set a 1:54.819 and BRC Racing’s home hero Norbert Michelisz also bettered Huff’s pace.
Ehrlacher was demoted to second place two minutes later despite improving his pace, as ALM Motorsport’s Néstor Girolami posted a 1:54.561.
With ten minutes to go he lowered the pace to 1:54.419, and that looked to be enough to end the session on top until Ma made an improvement of over 1.5 seconds to jump from sixth to first place little under two minutes left of the session.
He ended up fastest by 0.591s over Girolami, with Ehrlacher in third with the 1:54.750 lap he had set ten minutes in.
BRC Racing’s Mikel Azcona was one of only two drivers to improve when the chequered flag came out, and he slotted into fourth position by 1.065s off Ma’s pace.
Michelisz and Huff were shuffled down to fifth and sixth after setting their best laps early on, and Cyan Racing duo Santiago Urrutia and Thed Björk ended up seventh and eighth.
ALM’s Ruben Volt was the second of the drivers to improve at the finish, actually finding more pace on each of his last three laps while in ninth place.
The top ten was rounded out by MA:GP’s Lynk & Co 03 TCR-driving Viktor Andersson, who was 2.116s slower than Ma. Volt was asked to report to the race director straight after the session.
Prior to practice starting, race control decided to place tyre stacks at the turns six-seven chicane, which reduced the number of track limits violations there.
The second practice session begins at 17:43 local time (CEST).
