After missing the previous round at Brands Hatch for personal reason, Andrei Romanov returned to Liqui Moly Team Engstler.

After Colin Turkington's success at Brands Hatch, the number of additional points was limited to twelve to prevent a repeat of this.

[2] Chevrolet's Alain Menu set the pace in free practice one with SR-Sport's Gabriele Tarquini second and BMW driver Turkington third.

Their efforts were spoilt by a red flag brought out by Fabiani who had beached his car in a gravel trap, the stoppage meant neither driver was able to set a time fast enough to progress through to the top ten shoot–out.

Huff's team mate Menu was fifth alongside Norbert Michelisz and Tom Coronel shared the fourth row with the third factory Chevrolet car of Muller.

The safety car was brought out while the wreckage was cleared, and on the restart Turkington and Michelisz clashed with the eBay Motors driver losing control and taking out championship leader Muller.

By now the front four of Huff, Tarquini, Menu and Augusto Farfus had broken away from the rest of the field led by Turkington although Priaulx eventually passed him on the last lap to finish fifth.