Five times winner of the Cyprus Rally, Nasser Al-Attiyah, topped the qualifying stage times on Friday morning, taking his Ford Fiesta R5 through the 6.33 km test 1.8 seconds faster than Juuso Nordgren’s ŠKODA Fabia R5 and 2.5 seconds quicker than the Ford Fiesta R5 of 2016 winner Alexey Lukyanuk.
Cypriot Simos Galatariotis clocked a creditable 5th fastest time. At lunchtime the fastest 15 crews gathered at Larnaca seafront to pick their starting position for the rally proper, which kicks off early Saturday morning.
As expected, Al-Attiyah – who got first pick of the starting order – chose to run 15th on the road (which will give him a cleaner surface after the passage of the 14 cars running ahead of him sweep the gravel tracks of rocks). All the other top qualifiers followed his lead, so the running order for Leg 1 is the reverse of the qualifying times, and 15th fastest Juan Carlos Alonso will be first on the road, followed by Petros Panteli and Alexandros Tsouloftas.
Said Al Attiyah “it was a really nice stage – you know we like the rally.”
His Russian rival admitted that he will have his work cut out to beat the Qatari.
“It is a long way to be in front of many other drivers. Nasser knows better how to handle the surface,” he said.
Leg 1 starts at 08:30 today and crews will return for the overnight regroup just before 4pm. Tomorrow’s final Leg starts at 07:30, with the ceremonial finish on Larnaca seafront at 6pm.
The post Nasser fastest in qualifying round of Cyprus Rally appeared first on Cyprus Mail.
Read more → https://cyprus-mail.com/2018/06/15/nasser-fastest-in-qualifying-round-of-cyprus-rally/
Δεν υπάρχουν σχόλια:
Δημοσίευση σχολίου