Franco Girolami has topped a wet opening practice session in TCR Europe at the Salzburgring in Austria, four thousandths of a second ahead of ALM Motorsport’s Ignacio Montenegro.
The session took place on a very wet circuit, resulting in Girolami’s top time of 1 minute 33.709 seconds being around eight seconds slower than the TCR lap record of 1:25.481 set back in 2017 by Mat’o Homola in the TCR International Series.
Girolami topped the times on numerous occasions during the half hour session, although Montenegro put in his best lap on his sixth attempt, which denied Aurélien Comte second.
The SP Compétition driver ended up in third, a quarter of a second off Girolami’s time, having earlier on had brief spells at the top of the times himself.
MA:GP’s Viktor Andersson put his Lynk & Co in fourth, six tenths off the pace. Next up was a trio of Honda drivers, headed up by GOAT Racing’s Santiago Concepcion in his second TCR event, in front of ALM’s Ruben Volt and GOAT Racing’s Felipe Fernández in sixth and seventh respectively.
The top ten was completed by SP Compétition’s Giovanni Scamardi, Monlau Motorsport’s Viktor Davidovski and ALM’s Levente Losonczy.
Wildcard entry Sandro Soubek was 12th on his return to TCR competition, the Austrian contesting his first standalone TCR sprint races since 2021 in a first-generation Audi.
Rain is set to continue at the Austrian circuit on Saturday, potentially impacting qualifying late in the day.
Nicola Baldan failed to post a competitive time in the Comtoyou Racing Audi, over four seconds off the pace.
Second practice gets underway at 15:00 CEST (14:00 BST).
Session result
| POS | NO | NAT | DRIVER | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 72 |  |
Franco GIROLAMI | Monlau Motorsport | CUPRA León VZ TCR | 17 | 1:33.709 | – |
| 2 | 23 | |
Ignacio MONTENEGRO | ALM Motorsport | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 11 | 1:33.713 | 0.004 |
| 3 | 7 |  |
Aurélien COMTE | SP Compétition | CUPRA León VZ TCR | 16 | 1:33.977 | 0.268 |
| 4 | 10 |  |
Viktor ANDERSSON | MA:GP | Lynk & Co 03 TCR | 13 | 1:34.331 | 0.622 |
| 5 | 33 |  |
Santiago CONCEPCIÓN | GOAT Racing | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 16 | 1:34.352 | 0.643 |
| 6 | 27 |  |
Ruben VOLT | ALM Motorsport | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 11 | 1:34.422 | 0.713 |
| 7 | 19 | |
Felipe FERNÁNDEZ Gil | GOAT Racing | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 1:34.551 | 0.842 |
| 8 | 34 |  |
Giovanni SCAMARDI | SP Compétition | CUPRA León VZ TCR | 16 | 1:34.577 | 0.868 |
| 9 | 110 |  |
Viktor DAVIDOVSKI | Monlau Motorsport | CUPRA León VZ TCR | 17 | 1:34.656 | 0.947 |
| 10 | 64 |  |
Levente LOSONCZY | ALM Motorsport | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 12 | 1:34.920 | 1.211 |
| 11 | 11 | |
Rubén FERNÁNDEZ Gil | GOAT Racing | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 17 | 1:36.032 | 2.323 |
| 12 | 42 |  |
Sandro SOUBEK | Mair Racing Osttirol | Audi RS3 LMS TCR | 14 | 1:36.663 | 2.954 |
| 13 | 8 |  |
Nicola BALDAN | Baldan Group by Comtoyou | Audi RS3 LMS TCR II | 14 | 1:37.945 | 4.236 |