SEAT Sport's Yvan Muller topped the timesheets in testing at Okayama. The reigning champion's lap of 1:38.518 was 0.016 seconds faster than that of BMW's Augusto Farfus and 0.028 better than Tiago Monteiro's offering.

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Small margins covered the entire field in a close session as the top 13 cars were within one second of each other.

Andy Priaulx from Team BMW UK opened proceedings and improved his time on each of his first three flying laps. Despite holding the provisional fastest lap for the first ten minutes of the session, he was eventually placed seventh overall (1:38.835).

All five SEAT Sport cars were in the top eight following a surge in the final three minutes. Rickard Rydell (1:38.694) and Gabriele Tarquini (1:38.807) shot up the rankings to become fourth and fifth fastest while Jordi Gene set the sixth best time (1:38.817).

The top eight was rounded off by a 1:38.883 from Alain Menu of Chevrolet. James Thompson looked to be immediately on the pace in his LADA Priora after posting a time just 0.980 slower than Yvan Muller's to place him 13th.

Felix Porteiro was the leading Independent competitor (14th overall) followed by Stefano D'Aste (16th) and Japanese driver Nobuteru Taniguchi (18th).

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