Néstor Girolami led the second free practice in a drying session by four-tenths of a second ahead of Rob Huff, while many drivers didn’t have an opportunity to set times on a full slick set-up as the session was red-flagged with two minutes to go.
The track was wet to start with, but drivers quickly began fitting slicks on the cars, the first of which being championship leader Norbert Michelisz. His teammate Mikel Azcona was the quickest driver during the wet segment of the session and just as slicks became the right tyres to have, the session was red-flagged when the Hyundai of Hwang Doyun crashed out at Paiol. The session resumed with just under ten minutes to go, with most of the field heading out on slick tyres, though the conditions were still tricky, as proved by the two MacPro Racing Team Honda cars of Martin Xie Xin Zhe and Gary Kwok, who both slid off and nudged the barriers at Lisboa.
While Azcona was now on a fast lap, he caught a group of Cyan Racing Lynk & Co cars at the Melco hairpin and had to back off in the final sector. Thed Björk briefly went fastest, before he was outpaced by Girolami’s 2:37.165.
Huff went second, just four-tenths back, in 2:37:554, while GOAT Racing’s Marco Butti (2:39.279) and Dušan Borković (2:39.586) went third and fifth, split John Filippi (2:39.312), but before any further improvements could be made, the session was red-flagged again when the Hyundai of Martin Cao Hong Wei crashed out at R Bend and was narrowly avoided by teammates Andy Yan Cheuk Wan and Rainey He Xiao Le.
Rainey He was fastest in TCR China, seventh overall (2:41.348) ahead of Lo Sze Ho (2:41.804), while TCR Asia’s best was Max Hart in 16 position overall.
The next session is qualifying on Friday at 12:55am local time (05:55 CET).
Schedule
Friday - Qualifying, 12:55 (05:55 CET)
Saturday - Race 1, 12:40 (05:40 CET)
Sunday - Race 2, 11:00 (04:00 CET)
Qualifying and races will be streamed live HERE
Picture: WSC/Jun Qian Motorsport
