WTCC: Lopez denies Ma home pole

Jose Maria Lopez took his 12th career pole in a delayed World Touring Car Championship qualifying session at Shanghai, denying Citroen team-mate and home hero Ma Qing Hua.

A time of 1m49.447s not only gave Lopez pole position for race one but also made him the fourth most successful qualifier in WTCC history in only his second full season contesting the series.

Despite setting the fastest time in all of the earlier free practice sessions, Shanghai-born Ma could not mount a challenge to Lopez and lines up on the race one grid in second position.

Nicky Catsburg made a surprise appearance for Lada in the Q3 top five shootout, ultimately setting a time fast enough for third ahead of Sebastian Loeb and Yvan Muller.

Catsburg's Lada team-mate Rob Huff just missed out on reaching Q3 and will start in sixth position.

Campos Racing made a wise strategy call with its driver Hugo Valente in his Chevrolet, who ended qualifying in 10th place, giving him reverse-grid pole position for race two. His teammate John Filippi enjoyed his most successful qualifying of the season, lining up seventh on the grid for race one.

Tom Coronel was pleased with a ninth-place performance, as he starts race two in second but ROAL Motorsport team mate Tom Chilton was left lamenting a bad morning.

After his alarm failed to go off, he arrived late to the track and subsequently struggled to get his tyres up to temperature and watched himself slide down the order to end the session in 13th.

Other big name casualties of the first qualifying session were Honda drivers Tiago Monteiro and Norbert Michelisz. Both mistimed their final runs and ultimately could not set a lap quick enough for Q2. They start race one in 15th and 16th, respectively.

Originally on Autosport.com