Azcona dominates TCR Italy’s Qualifying at Imola

Mikel Azcona dominated TCR Italy’s Qualifying at Imola. The Spaniard drove his Volcano Motorsport CUPRA to the pole position, completing three laps under the 1:51 mark that nobody else was able to break. Eventually he inflicted a gap of eight tenths to Kevin Ceccon who was the best of the rest in second position, while Azcona’s teammate Evgenii Leonov qualified third, completing an excellent result for Volcano Motorsport.
The current leader of the standings, Eric Brigliadori, ranked fifth just behind Igor Stefanovski, while the other title contenders, Nicola Baldan, Antti Buri and Salvatore Tavano posted the seventh, eighth and ninth fastest lap respectively, which means Target Competition colleagues Buri and Baldan will share the front row on the top-eight reversed grid for Race 2.
Ceccon posted the first competitive lap of 1:51.832 just before the session was briefly red-flagged after seven minutes, when Sabatino Di Mare’s CUPRA DSG went off at the Villeneuve bend.
As soon as action resumed, Azcona clocked two consecutive fastest laps of 1:51.762 and 1:50.579. Behind the Spaniard, Tavano moved into P2 with a lap of 1:51.777 but was soon demoted to third by Leonov’s 1:51.226. Tavano dropped one more place, when Ceccon moved into P3 with a lap of 1:51.523 and then improved further to 1:51.073 to take second. Soon afterwards Brigliadori (1:51.328), Ruben Volt (1:51.437) and Baldan (1:51.703) advanced to fifth, sixth and seventh respectively.
The last ones to improve were Stefanovski (1:51.186) and Leonov (1:51.102) who were in contention for the third polace.
While his competitors were fighting for improving their starting positions on the grid for Race 1, Azcona was able to improve twice more with last attempts that were worth 1:50.365 and then 1:50.208.   
The live streaming of the first race will be tomorrow at 13:20 CEST on www.tcr-series.com.

Imola – Qualifying 
1:50.208 Mikel Azcona (Volcano Motorsport, CUPRA Leon Competición)
1:51.073 Kevin Ceccon (Aggressive Team Italia, Hyundai i30 N)
1:51.102 Evgenii Leonov (Volcano Motorsport, CUPRA Leon Competición)
1:51.186 Igor Stefanovski (AKK Stefanovski, Hyundai i30 N)
1:51.328 Eric Brigliadori (BF Motorsport, Audi RS 3 LMS)

Championship points
1. E. Brigliadori 211 pts; 2. A. Buri 201; 3. K. Ceccon 201 

Picture: ACI Sport