Honda’s Tiago Monteiro claimed his first World Touring Car Championship pole position since 2010 in qualifying at Vila Real in Portugal, ahead of Citroën’s Yvan Muller.
Monteiro put in a mistake-free run in Q3 unlike his rivals to secure just his third-ever pole in the WTCC, and his first since the Portuguese event in 2010.
Muller was the closest driver to the home racer, putting his C-Elysée in second, just 0.109 seconds behind Monteiro, despite having been the quickest driver in the Q1 session.
Honda duo Norbert Michelisz and Rob Huff were third and fourth respectively, with both drivers making mistakes on their final runs, firstly with the Hungarian brushing the barriers at Turn 14, before the Brit out-braked himself at Turn 6 and lost time in the corner.
Most notable was the fact that points leader José María López made two mistakes in qualifying. Firstly, the Argentine hit the wall in Q2, necessitating repairs that only just allowed him to set a time to get into Q3.
Then López made another mistake on his only run in Q3, carrying too much speed into Turn 21 near the end of the lap and sliding his Citroën through the corner, before going down the escape road. The mistake leaves him starting the Main Race from fifth on the grid.
Cyan Racing’s Thed Björk was the first driver to miss out on Q3, putting his Volvo in sixth for the Main Race, ahead of the leading Independent’s Trophy racer Mehdi Bennani in seventh, who was just ahead of Sébastien Loeb Racing team-mate Tom Chilton.
Dutch duo Nicky Catsburg and Tom Coronel will start from the front row of the grid for the Opening Race after qualifying in ninth and tenth place respectively, with Coronel’s reverse-grid pole position being the ROAL Motorsport driver’s first front-row start of the season.
The second Cyan Racing Volvo of Robert Dahlgren made it through to Q2 on his WTCC return but ultimately only managed 11th in qualifying for both races, whilst Münnich Motorsport’s James Thompson was 12th, continuing his run of form by getting into Q2 for the third consecutive time at the wheel of his Chevrolet.
Hugo Valente just missed out on entry into Q2 by less than a tenth of a second, with the Frenchman ultimately abandoning his last lap in the session which would have demoted Catsburg had he improved, leaving him in 13th position.
It was another disastrous session for the third LADA of Gabriele Tarquini, who qualified down in 17th position, ahead of only Zengő Motorsport’s rookie Dániel Nagy. Tarquini cited the technical issues in the morning as the cause, which in turn prevented him from gaining much experience of the car on the tricky street circuit in practice.
MAC3
Citroën won from Honda in MAC3, with the French manufacturer just 0.283 seconds faster than their Japanese rivals. Whilst Honda had been fastesr in the first half of the two-lap run, the Citroën trio came back stronger later on, with López homing in on Chilton to take the win for the marque.
LADA failed to put in a competitive showing, due in part to Gabriele Tarquini making a poor, and possibly false start, followed by a mistake further around on the two-lap run for the Italian. The Russian manufacturer ultimately finished over eight seconds behind their rivals.
Race one takes place at 15:05 WEST / BST on Sunday.
Top ten times
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 18 | Tiago MONTEIRO |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 1:56.633 | ||
| 2 | 68 | Yvan MULLER |  |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 1:56.742 | 0.109 | |
| 3 | 5 | Norbert MICHELISZ |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 1:58.373 | 1.740 | |
| 4 | 12 | Rob HUFF |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 1:59.031 | 2.398 | |
| 5 | 37 | José María LÓPEZ |  |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 2 | No time | N/A | |
| The following times are from Q2 | |||||||||
| 6 | 62 | Thed BJÖRK |  |
Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo S60 WTCC | 5 | 1:57.641 | 1.238 | |
| 7 | 25 | Mehdi BENNANI |  |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 6 | 1:57.734 | 1.331 | |
| 8 | 3 | Tom CHILTON | |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 5 | 1:58.148 | 1.745 | |
| 9 | 10 | Nicky CATSBURG |  |
LADA Sport Rosneft | LADA Vesta WTCC | 6 | 1:58.384 | 1.981 | |
| 10 | 9 | Tom CORONEL | |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 6 | 1:58.389 | 1.986 | |