Yvan Muller headed a Citroën 1-2-3 in qualifying for the World Touring Car Championship in Hungary, with team-mates José María López and Sébastien Loeb less than half a second behind.
Muller’s pole marked the second of the season for the Frenchman, whilst it will also be the first time Citroën start 1-2-3 on the grid should all of the times stand following post-qualifying technical checks.
Tiago Monteiro and Gabriele Tarquini made it through to Q3 for Honda but failed to challenge the Citroën dominance, with Monteiro just under half a second off the pace. Tarquini, who had been fastest in Q2, made a mistake on his single flying lap and was almost two seconds off the pace as a result.
Sixth fastest, having missed out on entry into Q3, was Proteam Racing’s Mehdi Bennani ahead of the ROAL Motorsport duo of Tom Chilton and Tom Coronel.
Münnich Motorsport’s Gianni Morbidelli made a late improvement to qualify ninth, ahead of Campos Racing’s Dušan Borković in tenth. A late improvement from Borkovic put the Serb in tenth and on pole position for race two, knocking Hugo Valente down to 11th where the Frenchman will start both races.
Problems for Norbert Michelisz meant that the Hungarian could not post a competitive lap time and he will start both of Sunday’s races from 12th on the grid. The home favourite had earlier given the home fans something to cheer about in Q1 when he went third fastest, but technical problems with his Honda curtailed his Q2 efforts.
TC1 drivers missing out on the opportunity to progress into Q2 were LADA’s Rob Huff, James Thompson and Mikhail Kozlovskiy in 13th, 14th and 16th respectively, whilst René Münnich also failed to make the cut in his Chevrolet Cruze and will start from 15th.
Pasquale di Sabatino was the top TC2 qualifier for the first time in 2014, outpacing team-mate Franz Engstler by half a second.
Top ten times
POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
1 | 1 | TC1 | Yvan MULLER | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 1:48.727 | 0.000 |
2 | 37 | TC1 | José María LÓPEZ | ![]() ![]() |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 1:48.761 | 0.034 |
3 | 9 | TC1 | Sébastien LOEB | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Citroën Total WTCC | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 3 | 1:49.113 | 0.386 |
4 | 18 | TC1 | Tiago MONTEIRO | ![]() ![]() |
Castrol Honda WTC Team | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 1:49.166 | 0.439 |
5 | 2 | TC1 | Gabriele TARQUINI | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Castrol Honda WTC Team | Honda Civic WTCC | 3 | 1:50.576 | 1.849 |
6 | 25 | TC1 | Mehdi BENNANI | ![]() ![]() |
Proteam Racing | Honda Civic WTCC | 4 | 1:49.745 | 1.018 |
7 | 3 | TC1 | Tom CHILTON | ![]() ![]() |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 4 | 1:49.757 | 1.030 |
8 | 4 | TC1 | Tom CORONEL | ![]() ![]() |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 5 | 1:50.428 | 1.701 |
9 | 10 | TC1 | Gianni MORBIDELLI | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 3 | 1:50.728 | 2.001 |
10 | 98 | TC1 | Dušan BORKOVIĆ | ![]() ![]() |
NIS Petrol by Campos Racing | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 4 | 1:51.937 | 3.210 |