Holdsworth and Cox make an Alfa Romeo front row in Australia

Lee Holdsworth and Jordan Cox made an all-Alfa Romeo front row for the opening round of the 2021 TCR Australia at Symmons Plains.
After emerging as the fastest in both yesterday’s Free Practice sessions and in today’s Q1, Ashley Seward Motorsport’s Holdsworth confirmed he’s the man to beat on the Tasman’s circuit that suits perfectly to the Giulietta Veloce cars. His teammate Jay Hanson completed an Alfa Romeo trio by posting the third fastest lap ahead of the Melbourne Performance Centre Audi RS 3 LMS of Chaz Mostert, while Michael Caruso, Cox’s colleague at Garry Rogers Motorsport, qualified his Giulietta in fifth position and will share the third row of the grid for Race 1 with Mostert’s teammate Luke King.
In an extremely tight Q1, that saw 17 of the 18 competitors covered by eight tenths, Holdsworth and Hanson posted the two fastest laps (55.8764 and 55.8967) ahead of King – the first one to break the 56-second wall – Mostert, Aaron Cameron’s Peugeot 308 and Josh Buchan’s Hyundai i30 N. 
After finishing eighth in Q1, James Moffat qualified his Renault Mégane RS in tenth position, while his teammate Dylan O’Keeffe who had topped the official test at Phillip Island ranked 13^th. The Wall Racing Honda Civic cars struggled to set competitive times, with 2019 vice-champion Tony D’Alberto posting the 11^th fastest lap and John Martin 18^th and last.
The best of the Hyundai drivers was Brad Shiels in the Tilton Racing car who was eighth fastest in Q2 ahead of HMO Customer Racing’s Buchan.
Race 1 will start at 16:55 local time (06:55 CET); live streaming at www.tcr-series.com.

Symmons Plains - Qualifying
55.5456 Lee Holdsworth (Ashley Seward Motorsport, Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce)
55.6387 Jordan Cox (Garry Rogers Motorsport, Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce)
55.7251 Jay Hanson (Ashley Seward Motorsport, Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce)
55.7829 Chaz Mostert (Melbourne Performance Centre, Audi RS 3 LMS)
55.8154 Michael Caruso (Garry Rogers Motorsport, Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce)

Picture: TCR Australia