Present:
Norbert Michelisz, Castrol Honda World Touring Car Team, DHL Pole Position winner
Nicky Catsburg, Polestar Cyan Racing, second position
Rob Huff, ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport, third position
Alexander Murdzevski Shedvin, Team Volvo Polestar, WTCC MAC3 winner representative

Q: 
Turning first to Norbert Michelisz. Pole position number four of your career, your first since 2015 and what a track to do it. You must be very satisfied with your performance?

NM:
I'm super happy with the results today. I had confidence from the first lap in FP1 yesterday and we knew that the car is great and the balance was okay. We fine-tuned a little bit in FP2 and after seeing the pace in Free Practice 2 I was confident to get into the top three. To be honest I wasn't sure that that was going to be enough for the first row but in the end the last lap was really good. There were no really big mistakes and it was enough to grab pole. After Monza we arrived to a circuit where – on paper – we thought we cannot fight for pole or the front row and it's really satisfying to achieve a result like this on a circuit like this.

Q:
It was a fantastic lap on a track that’s more than 25 kilometres long. Can you briefly explain to people here what it’s like to drive a lap of the Nordschleife in a World Touring Car?

NM:
It’s amazing and I mean it’s difficult to describe and I didn't have the experience how to really drive fast around here. It’s so special. After the first two rounds I knew that has to come a bit more. Fortunately, I was excited and it was again without any big mistakes. Driving 220, 240, 250kph around some areas here is quite demanding for the car and for the driver as well. This you cannot compare to any other circuit on the calendar. Days before you come here the excitement is there and you cannot have this anywhere else.

Q:
After a couple of bad weekends this a positive result for you, right?

NM:
It's good for the confidence. I mean the performance was there in the first couple of race weekends but I wasn't fortunate enough to get all the points. But now I think it’s a good step, good confidence boost, most of the points can be collected tomorrow. So we are happy with what we have today and we have to steer our focus especially on the Main Race tomorrow because here there’s a good possibility to overtake. You have to do some strategy. The plan is to stay in front, we will try to see what we can do with the car with the straight-line speed. All the team is really happy and as I said I'm confident not only for the race and especially also for the rest of the season.

Q:
We turn next to Alexander Murdzevski Schedvin from Polestar Cyan Racing. It’s the third time this season that your team has won WTCC MAC3 so can you talk us through that performance from your three drivers?

AMS:
Well first of all it's good to be back here racing in our ‘green’ office. We do a lot of work on our road cars so we're happy to race here again. It was clear before the start that [Tiago] Monteiro had a problem so we were able to more or less play it safe. You always want to push and give it all you have but it wasn’t necessary this time and we were able to cruise over the finish line.

Q:
It wasn’t quite pole for your team in the Main Race but Néstor Girolami will be on pole for the Opening Race. Can you explain the strategy employed by the team?

AMS:
Yes, the strategy came about during the session because Néstor had an almost pretty bad off, he was off track and he damaged the front of the car. So for a moment we didn't know if we should call off our presence in MAC3 or if we would go on with him again. So it was a lot of stress and we were not really sure if we should send the car out. But when we saw that everybody had already passed the finish line and improving from 10th to eighth would not make too much difference so we just decided that 10th would be good enough because that meant pole for the Opening Race.

Q:
We turn next to your driver Nicky Catsburg. Nicky it wasn't quite pole position but still an amazing effort from you. Can you explain your qualifying run?

NC:
It’s always very, very nice to have a free lap on the Nordschleife, you don't get that quite often. I wish I was P1. In the morning we had a very good car, we did a good time. We had a good car in the afternoon as well but unfortunately Norbi was even a bit quicker but still an amazing feeling to be P2. We had a little issue during the last lap, which didn’t help for MAC3 as well, but luckily had more problems than we had and we could win so a good day for us and we scored many points – four points for qualifying and points for MAC3 as well.

Q:
You’re also racing in the 24-hour race here Nicky but is that helping you or hindering you?

NC:
It’s helping in a way and it’s hindering in a way so it’s pretty equal. It’s helping because I have track time but it’s hindering sometimes because I spend a bit too much time elsewhere and instead of in the office working on the set-up. But we did a good job with the team and even with the 80 kilos we were still able to fight for pole and hopefully tomorrow as well for the races.

Q:
We come next to Rob Huff. Rob, pole position in the WTCC Trophy and of course third overall is probably more important for you and your team based here in Germany. How was your qualifying?

RH:
In the end it turned out okay. We had some problems on the first two runs with a rear vibration but the guys worked really hard to solve it. And then you probably saw at the beginning of my third run I went off the track I had a misfire and had a to do a full reset of the car, I’m not sure why Tom Chilton decided to stop with me but he parked next to me on the side of the track, which was quite interesting. And on the last lap we got a pretty solid lap in. I’m disappointed of course because we had a car we could have made the pole position with but huge congratulations to Norbi and Nicky. We’ve been quick all weekend as have the other two I think it wasn’t hard to guess it would come down to the three of us. It’s a good result for the team and it puts us in a good position for the races tomorrow.

Q:
Is there anything you’ve learned today or even yesterday that could make a difference for the races tomorrow?

RH:
I think the track's changing a lot. We had first Free Practice at 08h15 and then qualifying this afternoon. Speaking to everyone there’s a hell of a lot of understeer out on the track at the moment, the temperature has come up and everybody is struggling for front-end grip and this morning it was almost the opposite. Then we had the Audi TTs out before us and the track was quite dirty and dusty and it takes a bit of time to clean that up and it only takes one person to go off to put that all back on again. Certainly it’s pot luck when you get your lap in but as a team we’re happy with P3.