'Unbelievable' showing for Coronel.

Tom Coronel was left delighted after leading the Independent runners in qualifying for the British round of the World Touring Car Championship.

Coronel, competing in his new GR Asia SEAT Leon for the first time, proved to be more than a match for some of the works drivers as he secured a place on the fourth row of the grid - between the similar works Leons of former BTCC champions James Thompson and Gabriele Tarquini.

With current Yokohama Independents Trophy title leader Alessandro Balzan not competing at Brands this weekend, Coronel will be aiming to secure the championship lead for the first time this season and also pick up his first outright points of the year - and he was on a high after his qualifying display.

"That qualifying was just unbelievable!" he said. "In these conditions you can really show the potential of the team but you have to be clever and chose your moment. I'm very happy with the new car and for a lot of the session I was in a sandwich of two top drivers with Yvan Muller in front and Rydell behind. In that situation you just have to follow their lines.

"To be honest I didn't know what I was doing! I was just doing what they were doing! But obviously both myself and the car are capable of that pace or we'd have been in the wall."