Sebastien Loeb made himself the one to beat after setting stunning pace on both Q1 and Q2 on the opening day of the 2017 World RX of Hockenheim. Both races for the Frenchman run smoothly as he set fastest lap after fastest lap ahead of his Team Peugeot-Hansen team mates.
The intermediate standings see the former World Rally champion heading the times with only Johan Kristoffersson able to do anything about the Peugeot’s which see Timmy Hansen in third over night and Kevin Hansen fourth.
“Today has been a very good day. I first of all had a good start position with pole, here it seems to be quite important. I made some good starts, took the lead in each race and finally I had two clean races. I could do my own pace and it was enough to win both qualifying so that was a great start,” said Loeb.
“The car is easier to drive than last year, we are more consistent in our lap times. It’s more consistence, less tricky and more efficient. In rallycross you never know what can happen but for sure I will try to do the same tomorrow. We will see, we will try again to make good starts and we can hope for the same.”
Credit: FIA World RX / IMG
While Kristoffersson excelled, Petter Solberg had a day to forget after finishing Q1 in eighth place and the last in Q2 after a collision with Andreas Bakkerud saw the pair fight over who will take last place with the most damaged car. The pair languish in fourteenth and nineteenth.
Timur Timerzyanov had a promising day to finish fifth in the standings ahead of MJP Racing Team Austria’s Timo Scheider is sixth, while Ken Block took a race victory to secure seventh spot.
Reinis Nitiss is currently placed in eighth place, just 1 point ahead of team owner Mattias Ekstrom.
Rounding out the top twelve are Kevin Eriksson, Jean-Baptiste Dubourg and Janis Baumanis.
