Robert Dahlgren tops a close Qualifying at Falkenberg

Robert Dahlgren has claimed his second TCR Scandinavia pole position of the year for PWR Racing, leading a close session where a tenth of a second covered the top five.
The 2017 champion was fastest throughout practice, but by qualifying the Brink Motorsport team had upped their game, and were right on the tails of the PWR Racing CUPRA.
Dahlgren had set a safer banker lap in Qualifying 1, not needing to improve to make it into the second segment, while his teammate Mikaela Åhlin-Kottulinsky was fastest of all in the Q1, albeit by just 28-thousandths of a second over Tobias Brink’s Audi RS 3 LMS.
In Q2, Brink blasted out a time of 45.235 on his first run, while Dahlgren’s time was two-tenths slower and put the CUPRA driver fourth after everyone’s first run.
With a new set of tyres, Dahlgren went out again and managed to find some more time from his car, pushing himself ahead of Brink’s Audi by 15-thousandths of a second, while Åhlin-Kottulinsky improved to put her CUPRA third, just 0.035 seconds back.
Mattias Andersson, who had changed his engine after practice and with his Honda Racing Sweden squad working hard to improve the car’s set up, was also on the pace, with the Swedish touring car veteran qualifying fourth, just 0.073 seconds from Dahlgren’s time.
Andreas Ahlberg picked up the final qualifying point with fifth in his Micke Kågered Racing Volkswagen Golf GTI, just a fraction over a tenth down, while Andreas Wernersson qualified sixth, suffering a minor drama after the rear window of his Audi blew out in the second session.
This means Wernersson, who is 11 points behind Dahlgren in the standings going into tomorrow’s races, will get to start the second reversed grid race from pole position. 
“I knew it was going to be close, but not that close.” Said Dahlgren. “We always planned to go again, but when I saw my predicted time, I realised it was going to be really close. I think we have a good race car. In qualifying, the car wasn’t quite working, it was too loose, but I know it’s a good race car, so it should be good fun and I’m looking forward to the races.”
The two races will start tomorrow at 13:00 and 15:20 local time (CET) and will be streamed live at www.tcr-series.com and www.tcr-series.tv.

Qualifying
45.220 Robert Dahlgren (PWR Racing, CUPRA)
45.235 Tobias Brink (Brink Motorsport, Audi RS 3 LMS)
45.270 Mikaela Åhlin-Kottulinsky (PWR Racing, CUPRA)
45.293 Mattias Andersson (Honda Racing Sweden, Honda Civic FK2)
45.323 Andreas Ahlberg (Micke Kågered Racing, Volkswagen Golf GTI)

Championship points
1. Dahlgren 120 pts; 2. Wernersson 109; 3. Ahlberg 98