28 Apr 2012

The top four times, in fact, were set by SEAT León drivers, with Michal Matějovský second fastest (2:18.582) and the two Single-Make series competitors Stian Paulsen (2:18.701) and Patrick Nemec (2:19.530) rounding off the top four places.
In all, 19 of the 26 registered drivers chose to take part in Free Practice, with the most notable driver missing being Petr Fulín. The Czech BMW driver was fastest in the first Testing session this morning and chose to miss both the second Test and Free Practice. Two of the three Maurer Motorsport Chevrolet Aveo drivers did likewise; only Russia’s Alexander Frolov (2:40.133) took part in the session and could only manage a time around six seconds or so off the pace set by Super 1600 front runner Kevin Krammes in a Ford Fiesta (2:33.622).
In the Super Production category, both of the Honda Civic Type R drivers chose to use Free Practice to gain valuable experience of the Slovakia Ring circuit. Less than two seconds split the pair at the end of the half-hour, with Nikolay Karamyshev (2:28.883) ahead of Aleksandar Tošić (2:30.594).
The ETCC competitors seem to have learned the track’s trickier spots, with only the Honda Civic of Peter Rikli (Turn 1) and Ronny Reinsberger’s Ford Fiesta (T6) exploring the gravel during the session.