Kusiri fastest in wet Qualifying at Yeongam
On his first appearance at the wheel of the Viper Niza Racing SEAT León, TCR Asia returnee and reigning champion Kantadhee Kusiri outpaced the rest of the field in a wet Qualifying session at Yeongam’s Korea International Circuit.
After posting the fastest lap in Q1 (2:42.125), Kusiri encored in Q2 (2:42.539) and secured pole position for tomorrow’s Race 1 that will be valid as TCR Asia’s round 7 and TCR Korea’s round 1.
Liqui Moly Team Engstler’s Luca Engstler posted the second fastest lap (2:44.061) in his Volkswagen Golf GTI and scored the five points for the pole position, as Kusiri is not a TCR Asia registered competitor. This helped the German youngster to reduce his gaps in the standings from the leader, his own teammate Mitchell Cheah, and from Maximum Racing’s Lo Sze Ho who is currently second. Cheah, who qualified fourth today tops the classification with 103 points; Lo Sze Ho follows with 98, while Engstler is a further five points behind.
Diego Moran in the third Golf GTI car run by the Liqui Moly Team Engstler posted the third fastest lap (2:45.100) that was later deleted for a track limit infringement, meaning that he was dropped to 11th. Therefore, Cheah (2:47.904) will start Race 1 from third, with Thai guest driver Chariya Nuya (2:48.863) fourth in the Billionaire Boy Racing Honda Civic FK2.
The fifth and seventh positions on the grid were conquered by Kang Byung Hui (2:49.179) in the Indigo Racing Hyundai i30 N and Andrew Kim (2:49.379) in the Brand New Racing Golf GTI. They were first and second of the TCR Korea competitors.
Another Korean driver, Kang Dong Woo in the KMSA Motorsport Hyundai will start from pole position of the top-ten reverse grid for Race 2, with Lo Sze Ho’s Honda Civic FK2 alongside him.
Race 1 for TCR Asia and TCR Korea is scheduled for 10:45am on Sunday (3:45am CET); live streaming at www.tcr-series.tv.
