Ourdzhev claims a second consecutive pole in TCR Russia

Egor Orudzhev snatched a second consecutive pole position for TCR Russia’s opening race at the Moscow Raceway by the slimmest of margins; Orudzhev in his Lukoil Racing Audi RS 3 LMS beat the Hyundai i30 N of teammate Ivan Lukashevich by just eight thousandths of a second.
It was Lukashevich who was first to show his hand in the twenty-minute Qualifying session, lapping in 1:42.974 to top the timesheet ahead of Andrej Maslennikov in another Lukoil Hyundai (1:43.677). The pair were soon eclipsed by Zakhar Slutskiy’s Carville Racing Hyundai (1:42.893), with both Dmitry Bragin (1:43.187) and Mikhail Mityaev (1:43.135) going quicker than Maslennikov.
Around halfway through the session, the A.M.G. Motorsport LADA Vesta Sport of Egor Fokin went quickest with a time of 1:42.858, but he was soon beaten by Lukashevich, who improved with a 1:42.844. Kirill Ladygin’s first competitive lap was a 1:43.055 which was enough to give the LADA Vesta driver P4, although he was quickly edged out by Bragin with a 1:42.909. 
With around five minutes remaining, there was a flurry of quick lap times. First, Orudzhev went fastest with a 1:42.543 before Lukashevich improved his best time with a lap of 1:42.551 but just failed to beat Orudzhev.  Ladygin then improved to go P3 (1:42.640) although he was also swiftly beaten by Slutskiy (1:42.611). Right at the end of the session, Pavel Kalmanovich set his best lap of 1:42.845 which was enough for P5 behind Ladygin. Apart from Orudzhev’s narrow margin over Lukashevich, another indicator of just how close things were was the fact that the top four were separated by less than a tenth of a second.
Live streaming of both races will be on Sunday at www.tcr-series.com; Race 1 at 11:45, Race 2 at 16:15 local times (10:45 and 15:15 CEST).

Moscow Raceway - Qualifying
1:42.543 Egor Orudzhev (Lukoil Racing Team, Audi RS 3 LMS)
1:42.551 Ivan Lukashevich (Lukoil Racing Team, Hyundai i30 N)
1:42.611 Zakhar Slutskiy (Carville Racing, Hyundai i30 N)
1:42.640 Kirill Ladygin (LADA Sport Rosneft, LADA Vesta Sport)
1:42.845 Pavel Kalmanovich (AG Team, CUPRA)

Championship points:
1. K. Ladygin 116 pts; 2. D. Bragin 91; 3. M. Mityaev 76

Picture: SMP/Marat Daminov