Honda’s Norbert Michelisz was the pace-setter in the first World Touring Car Championship practice session on the streets of Vila Real in Portugal, as Tom Coronel exited the session early after crashing into a fire rescue van.
Michelisz, who is recovering from a bout of illness he picked up during the week, posted the fastest lap towards the end of the session, with the Hungarian being one of six drivers to drop below the two-minute mark.
Times were notably lower than the qualifying records set by the field in 2016, where all bar three laps were below two minutes. Michelisz focussed on taking the new joker lap during the session, limiting his potential to put in representative fast times.
“We struggled a bit with the grip level, we had some understeer, but looking at the lap times it seems that the others had similar problems,” said Michelisz. “I tried to do as much joker lap practice as possible.
“[The joker lap] is a bit different to what I expected because, looking from the outside, the kerb doesn’t seem to be too high, but when I tried to jump it one or two times it didn’t really feel good, so it was quite unsettling on the car.”
Michelisz’s Honda team-mate Tiago Monteiro was second quickest at his home circuit, despite some early issues with power steering early on in the session. The Portuguese racer was just over half a second slower.
Third fastest was the leading Polestar Volvo of Thed Björk, who was over a second off the pace, ahead of Münnich Motorsport’s Rob Huff in fourth.
Polestar’s championship leader Nicky Catsburg was fifth, whilst sixth-placed Mehdi Bennani was the last driver within a second of the pace in his Sébastien Loeb Racing Citroën.
Japanese racer Ryo Michigami made sure all three factory Honda’s were inside the top ten with the eighth quickest lap, just behind Volvo’s Néstor Girolami.
Ninth-fastest Yann Ehrlacher clouted the barrier early on in the session, but the RC Motorsport LADA driver was able to continue after some repairs to his car.
The 45-minute session proved to be incident-filled, with ROAL Motorsport’s Tom Coronel coming off worst when he locked up heading into Turn 19, lost a wheel when clouting the kerb of a roundabout, and speared into the side of a parked fireman’s van.
There was a further delay eight minutes from the end of the session when a stray pet dog made it onto the circuit and had to be retrieved by the local marshals.
Second practice takes place at 12:00 WEST (12:00 BST, 13:00 CEST), with qualifying following at 15:30 WEST (15:30 BST, 16:30 CEST).
Session results
| POS | NO | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 5 | Norbert MICHELISZ |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 15 | 1:58.118 | 0.000 |
| 2 | 18 | Tiago MONTEIRO |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 14 | 1:58.709 | 0.591 |
| 3 | 62 | Thed BJÖRK |  |
Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo S60 Polestar | 15 | 1:59.135 | 1.017 |
| 4 | 12 | Rob HUFF |  |
ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 17 | 1:59.248 | 1.130 |
| 5 | 63 | Nicky CATSBURG |  |
Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo S60 Polestar | 15 | 1:59.705 | 1.587 |
| 6 | 25 | Mehdi BENNANI |  |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 15 | 1:59.734 | 1.616 |
| 7 | 61 | Néstor GIROLAMI |  |
Polestar Cyan Racing | Volvo S60 Polestar | 14 | 2:00.257 | 2.139 |
| 8 | 34 | Ryo MICHIGAMI |  |
Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda Civic WTCC | 17 | 2:00.830 | 2.712 |
| 9 | 68 | Yann EHRLACHER |  |
RC Motorsport | LADA Vesta WTCC | 16 | 2:01.047 | 2.929 |
| 10 | 3 | Tom CHILTON | |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 15 | 2:01.096 | 2.978 |
| 11 | 86 | Esteban GUERRIERI | |
Campos Racing | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 13 | 2:01.170 | 3.052 |
| 12 | 27 | John FILIPPI | |
Sébastien Loeb Racing | Citroën C-Elysée WTCC | 16 | 2:01.809 | 3.691 |
| 13 | 8 | Aurélien PANIS | |
Zengő Motorsport Kft | Honda Civic WTCC | 12 | 2:02.312 | 4.194 |
| 14 | 9 | Tom CORONEL | |
ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 | 6 | 2:03.147 | 5.029 |
| 15 | 22 | Manuel FERNANDES | |
RC Motorsport | LADA Vesta WTCC | 11 | 2:03.903 | 5.785 |
| 16 | 99 | Dániel NAGY | |
Zengő Motorsport Kft | Honda Civic WTCC | 14 | 2:06.302 | 8.184 |
| 17 | 24 | Kevin GLEASON |  |
RC Motorsport | LADA Vesta WTCC | 12 | 2:12.761 | 14.643 |