José María López again set the pace in second practice for the World Touring Car Championship around the Nürburgring Nordschleife, with the Citroën driver going fastest on a drying track in the closing minutes of the session.
With the session starting on a damp track thanks to overnight rainfall, it was López who was first to post a time in the hour-long session, with his first lap coming in at 10 minutes 28.300 seconds.
The reigning champion managed to knock ten minutes off that time on his second run, continuing to lead the field in practice, with many drivers trying to avoid unnecessary risk taking around the challenging circuit.
Most of the changes happened inside the final ten minutes of the session, with ROAL Motorsport’s To’ Coronel being the first to knock López off the top spot with seven minutes to go.
Honda’s Tiago Monteiro was the first driver to break into the 9-minute laptimes, immediately followed by Sébastien Loeb Racing’s Tom Chilton.
A flurry of faster times then followed from the LADA trio and Citroën’s Yvan Muller, before López finally laid down the gauntlet on a drying circuit, although his lap was still almost a minute slower than his best time on Thursday.
LADA’s Gabriele Tarquini ended up second fastest, the Italian being 2.723 seconds adrift, ahead of team-mate Hugo Valente in third, whose car was repaired by the team overnight following his first practice crash.
Norbert Michelisz was the leading Honda driver in fourth, just over five seconds off the pace, ahead of the third LADA of Nicky Catsburg, who proved the pace of the Vesta around the Nordschleife.
Muller ended up in sixth, 9.094 seconds slower than his team-mate, ahead of Chilton, Monteiro, Mehdi Bennani and the third SLR Citroën of Grégoire Demoustier.
It proved to be another challenging session for Nordschleife expert Sabine Schmitz, with the German making a mistake on her first flying lap and making contact with the barriers, preventing her posting a competitive lap time.
Neither of the Polestar Cyan Racing Volvos of Fredrik Ekblom or Thed Björk managed to post a competitive time either, with the Swedish duo over fine minutes off the pace as a result. Ekblom had earlier been forced to have an engine change after first practice, which means he will start race one from the back of the grid, irrespective of what happens in qualifying.
Qualifying takes place at 12:45 CEST (11:45 BST).
Session results
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 37 | José María LÓPEZ |  |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 9:41.561 | 0.000 | |
| 2 | 2 | Gabriele TARQUINI |  |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 4 | 9:44.284 | 2.723 | |
| 3 | 7 | Hugo VALENTE |  |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 4 | 9:46.414 | 4.853 | |
| 4 | 5 | Norbert MICHELISZ |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 9:46.828 | 5.267 | |
| 5 | 10 | Nicky CATSBURG |  |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 3 | 9:47.818 | 6.257 | |
| 6 | 68 | Yvan MULLER | |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 9:50.655 | 9.094 | |
| 7 | 3 | T | Tom CHILTON |  |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 9:55.224 | 13.663 |
| 8 | 18 | Tiago MONTEIRO |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 9:59.830 | 18.269 | |
| 9 | 25 | T | Mehdi BENNANI |  |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 10:01.629 | 20.068 |
| 10 | 11 | T | Grégoire DEMOUSTIER | |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 10:01.677 | 20.116 |
| 11 | 9 | T | Tom CORONEL | |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 3 | 10:04.448 | 22.887 |
| 12 | 27 | T | John FILIPPI | |
Campos Racing | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 3 | 10:14.845 | 33.284 |
| 13 | 55 | T | Ferenc FICZA | |
Zengő Motorsport | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 10:16.161 | 34.600 |
| 14 | 12 | Rob HUFF | |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 2 | 10:29.048 | 47.487 | |
| 15 | 8 | T | Sabine SCHMITZ |  |
ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 1 | 14:52.523 | 5:10.962 |
| 16 | 61 | Fredrik EKBLOM |  |
Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo S60 WTCC | 3 | 14:58.188 | 5:16.627 | |
| 17 | 62 | Thed BJÖRK | |
Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo S60 WTCC | 3 | 19:48.343 | 10:06.782 |