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The Cruzes Dominate Monza Qualifying With A Striking 1-2-3

Slipstreaming strategy decisive, Huff takes third pole of the year

2011-05-14

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The Chevrolet Cruzes achieved a magnificent 1-2-3 in today’s qualifying session in , as Rob Huff gained his third pole in three events, ahead of team mates and . The RML built Cruzes worked perfectly on the legendary Italian circuit, despite the weight compensation they are carrying as from this event. The performance of the Cruze was also confirmed by the sixth place of Darryl O’Young at the wheel of the privateer car entered by Bamboo Engineering.

The Cruzes will hence start from the first two rows in Race 2 tomorrow, but are also ideally placed in the grid for Race 1, as Huff will start from P2, Muller from P4 and Menu from P6. Tomorrow, weather could play a role as rain is being predicted by all forecasts.

·         QUOTES

Rob Huff (1^st): “It’s a wonderful feeling to be on the pole again! The car worked well and our strategy also. We made perfect use of slipstreaming and had drawn the order by which each driver would tow the two others. Slipstreaming is always an essential factor in Monza and could play a role in the races tomorrow, where we will of course try to keep the team’s advantage shown today.”

Yvan Muller (2^nd): “It was a good day for team and for me too. I fought for the pole but fell short 97 thousands from the pole. I know exactly where I lost them, it was a little mistake in the Parabolica, probably because I was too close to Alain who was towing me. But we are all competitive and tomorrow I’m sure it will be very interesting.”

Alain Menu (3^rd): “It’s a very good result for the team, who worked very well. I was a little bit unlucky in my fast lap, but tomorrow what counts is tomorrow’s races and I will aiming at taking as many points as possible.”

Eric Nève: “We are clearly delighted with today’s result and happy that the slipstreaming strategy worked perfectly. We have to thank also Bamboo Engineering and Darryl O’Young, who helped us in Q2 to abort our competitor’s attempts to prevent our drivers to tow each other. Darryl also did a terrific qualifying and it is nice to see a Cruze fighting at top in the Independents’ Trophy as well.”

QUALIFYING 2 RESULT

1. R Huff               Chevrolet Cruze        1m59s034

2. Y Muller            Chevrolet Cruze        + 0s097

3. A Menu             Chevrolet Cruze        + 0s399

4. N Michelisz          BMW 320 TDI             + 0s424

5. T Monteiro         SEAT León TDI          + 0s540

6. D O’Young        Chevrolet Cruze          + 0s832

RACE 1 GRID POSITIONS

1. T Monteiro         SEAT León TDI          (2m00s549)

2. R Huff               Chevrolet Cruze        (2m00s515)

3. G Tarquini         SEAT León TDI          (2m00s504)

4. Y Muller            Chevrolet Cruze        (2m00s382)

5. M Bennani         BMW 320 TC              (2m00s287)

6. A Menu             Chevrolet Cruze        (2m00s279)