José María López has made the best possible start to his FIA World Touring Car Championship title defence by going fastest in testing for WTCC JVCKENWOOD Race of France this morning.
At a rain-hit Circuit Paul Ricard, López headed Citroën team-mate Yvan Muller with Norbert Michelisz the top Honda driver in third followed by leading WTCC Trophy contender Mehdi Bennani.
Nicky Catsburg was the fastest LADA Sport Rosneft runner in seventh with Fredrik Ekblom the quickest of the two Polestar Cyan Racing Volvo drivers.
This morning’s 30-minute test was the first running of 2016 when all WTCC manufacturers were on track at the same time. Next up for the WTCC drivers is Free Practice 1 from 08h45 local time on Saturday.
| Pos. | Driver | Team | Car | Time |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jose Maria Lopez | Citroen Total WTCC | Citroen | 1:44.077 |
| 2 | Yvan Muller | Citroen Total WTCC | Citroen | 1:44.553 |
| 3 | Norbert Michelisz | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 1:44.725 |
| 4 | Mehdi Bennani | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 1:44.826 |
| 5 | Tom Chilton | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 1:44.849 |
| 6 | Tom Coronel | ROAL Motorsport | Chevrolet | 1:45.437 |
| 7 | Nicky Catsburg | LADA Sport | Lada | 1:45.774 |
| 8 | Tiago Monteiro | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 1:45.856 |
| 9 | Gabriele Tarquini | LADA Sport | Lada | 1:45.874 |
| 10 | Grégoire Demoustier | Sebastien Loeb Racing | Citroen | 1:46.328 |
| 11 | Hugo Valente | LADA Sport | Lada | 1:47.306 |
| 12 | Rob Huff | Honda Racing Team JAS | Honda | 1:47.661 |
| 13 | John Filippi | Campos Racing | Chevrolet | 1:48.477 |
| 14 | Fredrik Ekblom | Polestar Cyan | Volvo | 1:49.567 |
| 15 | Thed Bjork | Polestar Cyan | Volvo | 1:50.022 |
| 16 | Rene Munnich | Munnich Motorsport | Chevrolet | 1:52.820 |
| 17 | Ferenc Ficza | Zengo | Honda | -:—.--- |
| 18 | Daniel Nagy | Zengo | Honda | -:—.--- |