Halliday starts from 4th

The twofold winner from Bahrain starts into the European season of the Porsche Mobil1 Supercup from pole position. After his strong performance in the desert, Jeroen Bleekemolen secured his third straight pole position in his second lap of the qualifying on the Circuit de Catalunya near Barcelona. The Dutchman continues his immaculate success streak and takes up the third race of the season on Sunday as the favourite.

Lining up alongside the title defender from Konrad Motorsport in the first row is Richard Westbrook from Great Britain. Competing for Federsand-Jetstream Motorsport, the Supercup winner from 2006 and 2007 clocked his fastest time in the seventh lap and relegated René Rast (Germany) to third on the grid. The reigning Carrera Cup champion, who concentrates on the Supercup this season with his VELTINS MRS Racing team, brought home an excellent second from Bahrain and shares the second row with newcomer Matt Halliday from New Zealand (Federsand-Jetstream Motorsport). Halliday currently leads the ‘Rookie’ classification.

Two pilots of Walter Lechner Racing School occupy the third row: Stefan Rosina (Slovakia) and Damien Faulkner (Ireland), vice champion of 2007 and 2008, followed by Austria’s Norbert Siedler (VELTINS MRS Racing) and Jiri Janak (Konrad Motorsport) from the Czech Republic on the fourth row. The ninth fastest was the Supercup stalwart Patrick Huisman (Netherlands), who heads the list of records with four championship titles in succession (1997 to 2000) and 24 wins. Rounding off the top ten is Britain’s Richard Williams, his team mate at SPS Performance.

Television stations “Eurosport 2” and “Premiere” broadcast the race on the Circuit de Catalunya on Sunday, 10th May, live from 11.40 hours. Additionally, “Eurosport” televises highlights on Sunday evening in its “Motorsports Weekend” programme.

Jeroen Bleekemolen (pole-sitter): “Again everything ran smoothly. I only turned one flying lap and it was perfect. You can’t expect much more than that. Like in Bahrain, we even managed to save one set of new tyres. My team boss will be pleased.”

Richard Westbrook (second qualifier): “I’m very pleased. That was better than in Bahrain. The car ran really well. With the first set of tyres it wasn’t so good but the second set was better. Still, the track was slower, otherwise I could have even grabbed pole.”

René Rast (third qualifier): “I’m a little annoyed to be just one-tenth of a second behind Jeroen. My fast lap wasn’t perfect – I made two minor errors in the first sector. But okay, now I have to be better tomorrow. It would be great to bring home another podium result.”

Qualifying
1. Jeroen Bleekemolen (NED), Konrad Motorsport, 1:49.773 minutes
2. Richard Westbrook (GBR), Federsand-Jetsetream Motorsport, + 0.075
3. René Rast (GER), VELTINS MRS Racing, + 0.101
4. Matt Halliday (NZL), Federsand-Jetstream Motorsport, + 0.219
5. Stefan Rosina (SVK), Walter Lechner Racing School, + 0.233