CURITIBA, 29^th February 2008 – The first official testing session of the 2008 World Touring Car Championship saw all three official manufacturer teams qualify their cars in the top ten, all covered by less than a second. Chevrolet’s Nicola Larini led the proceedings for the better part of the session, but got passed in the final minutes of the session. While qualifying is not until tomorrow and some competitors might be hiding their game, the three Chevrolet Lacetti drivers are nevertheless cautiously happy with the way things are going.

QUOTES

Nicola Larini (5^th): “It’s difficult to say exactly where we stand, as we of course don’t know how the other teams are running their cars. But I’m happy, especially with the handling of the car which feels good. This explains that we are faster coming out of the corners compared to last year, but of course last year we were running a 2006-spec car as we only introduced the 2007-spec car at the first European race, whereas now we’re running the 2008-spec Lacetti.”

Alain Menu (8^th): “The track is very slippery, especially the part they resurfaced. In the last turn, for instance, everything feels okay and then suddenly you lose the rear. But other than that everything felt okay with but a few small things to change.”

Rob Huff (9^th): “The car feels good, the balance is good, but gently does it at the moment. I used two sets of new tyres and on my second set I set the same lap time on three consecutive laps, so I’m pretty pleased.”

CURITIBA TESTING RESULTS