World Touring: Lopez leads first Nordschleife practice

Jose Maria Lopez set the pace in Thursday's pre-race World Touring Car Championship test on the Nurburgring Nordschleife, despite a misfire on his Citroen.

The reigning WTCC champion, who had also been quickest in the series' first run on the Nordschleife last month, set his 8m41.192s lap before the misfire struck and forced him to stop.

The factory Citroens filled the top three, with Sebastien Loeb seven tenths of a second down on Lopez in second and Yvan Muller another six tenths back.

An initial Citroen sweep of the leading places was prevented when Campos Chevrolet driver Hugo Valente and works Honda duo Gabriele Tarquini and Tiago Monteiro pushed the C-Elysees of Ma Qinq Hua and Mehdi Bennani back to seventh and eighth.

Lada's new recruit Jaap van Lagen took ninth in James Thompson's former car. The team is only running two Vestas for van Lagen and Rob Huff this weekend. Tom Chilton completed the top 10.

Nordschleife specialist Sabine Schmitz was stymied by a vibration on her Munnich Chevrolet and brought up the rear of a 17-car field covered by 26.821s on the 12.9-mile layout.

Due to the length of the venue, the test session was increased from the usual 30 minutes to one hour, with refuelling permitted.

The WTCC pack has a further practice session before an early evening qualifying session on Friday, with both races held on Saturday ahead of the start of the Nurburgring 24 Hours.

Originally on Autosport.com