James Nash’s SEAT León emerged as the fastest car in the second Free Practice, meaning that the Craft-Bamboo Lukoil crew did a perfect job in repairing it after the spectacular shunt it suffered during yesterday’s testing.
Nash’s teammate Pepe Oriola set the pace in the first half of the session, posting three consecutive provisional fastest laps of 1:45.259, 1:44.751 and 1:44.557. Petr Fulín moved up to a provisional second place in his Mulsanne Racing Alfa Romeo Giulietta (1:44.886).
The last ten minutes provided full of improvements. Gianni Morbidelli drove his Honda Civic around the Chang International Circuit in 1:44.358, but he was later demoted to second by Nash’s 1:44.183 that is the fastest lap clocked so far during the event.
Oriola (1:44.557) ranked in third ahead of Jean-Karl Vernay’s Volkswagen Golf (1:44.561), Mikhail Grachev’s Honda Civic (1:44.648), the impressive Kantadhee Kusiri in the Team Eakie BBR Kaiten Honda Civic (1:44.656) and Fulín (1:44.886).
The positions between eighth and tenth were taken by Mat’o Homola (1:45.167), Stefano Comini (1:45.382) and Rafaël Galiana (1:45.596).
Luigi Ferrara and his Subaru WRX were less impressive than in the first session, as they only clocked the 18^th fastest lap, 2.5 seconds off the pace.
The Qualifying session will kick off at 15:25 local time (live streaming on www.tcr-series.com and www.tcr-series.tv).