Yann Ehrlacher on FIA TCR World Tour pole in hot Morocco
Lynk & Co Cyan Racing’s Yann Ehrlacher took FIA TCR World Tour pole on the return of international touring car racing to Marrakech’s Moulay El Hassan street circuit.
The first segment of qualifying lasted 30 minutes, and with a 15-car grid it meant only three drivers failed to progress to Q2.
Ehrlacher was fastest at first in Q1, then BRC Racing Hyundai N Squadra Corse’s Norbert Michelisz went to the top four minutes in with a 50.569.
GOAT Racing’s Dušan Borković beat him three minutes later, as most of the frontrunners concluded their first runs and returned to the pits.
Just before the 10-minute mark there was a change at the top, with Lynk & Co driver Santiago Urrutia setting a 50.399 to go fastest by 0.085 seconds over GOAT Racing’s Esteban Guerrieri and 0.09s over Team Clairet Sport’s local star Mehdi Bennani.
A minute later Urrutia was in third behind Michelisz and Volcano Motorsport’s John Filippi, then he was demoted to fifth by team-mates Ehrlacher and Ma Qing Hua.
The end of the second runs led to a near-empty track again, and during that period Thed Björk and Borković went third and fifth fastest.
Moments after Björk completed his lap, red flags waved due to Bennani crashing his Cupra León VZ TCR into the barrier after clouting a tyre stack. On whether the car could be fixed in time for Race 1 on Saturday he said “I don’t know, now is very early to speak about tomorrow”.
Q1 restarted eight minutes later and with 14 minutes still left on the session clock. Ma and Urrutia went second and third fatet upon returning to track, but then joined their rivals in the pits again and for a while only Clairet’s Julien Piguet and Marco Butti were setting laps as they tried to get into the top 12.
Both managed to make it, with Bennani, fellow Moroccan Sami Taoufik and Victor Fernández failing to make the cut. Volcano driver Taoufik blamed damage he had carried over from practice for his lack of pace.
At the top, Azcona went fastest by 0.035s with just under four minutes to go and Ehrlacher slotted into second place in the final minute as one of the few drivers to take the chequered flag. Girolami and Butti also improved to seventh and eighth late on.
Q2 lasted 15 minutes and Michelisz laid down a strong first marker with a 50.180 lap. Seconds later Ehrlacher and Urrutia set the first sub-50s laps of the day, with Girolami going third fastest.
Ehrlacher lowered the pace further to 49.641 eight minutes in, as Michelisz improved to 49.939 in third, Azcona went fifth fastest and Piguet rose to sixth. As he sought to go faster, Piguet hit a tyre stack hard and the damage forced him to stop on track, resulting in a lengthy red flag stoppage.
Although there was plenty of time for improvements once Q2 restarted, few drivers did as the track got hotter.
Girolami and Filippi went fourth and fifth fatest with three minutes to go, and when the chequered flag appeared Björk found more pace but could do no better than 11th place. That meant he missed out on reversed-grid pole, which provisionally goes to Ma.
Race 1 takes place at 11:30 local time (WEST) on Saturday.
