Qualifying report
WEC Spa-Francorchamps
Porsche takes 1-2-3 clean sweep at Spa
Porsche dominated the qualifying session for tomorrow’s second round of the World Endurance Championship at Spa, claiming a 1-2-3 sweep with its 919 Hybrids.
Edited: May 1, 2015, 6:17 PM
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The #17 car of Timo Bernhard, Mark Webber and Brendon Hartley followed up their Silverstone pole after setting a scintillating average lap speed of 1m54.767s.
After taking pole, Bernhard was quick to pay tribute to his hero Stefan Bellof, who died at Spa in 1985.
“This is really a special and a great moment to pay tribute to Stefan Bellof,” said Bernhard, who is racing in a replica Bellof helmet this weekend. “He was a great idol of mine and I think he would be proud of what Porsche achieved today.
“It is a perfect start for us as we head in to the race tomorrow. It shows we have a quick package but we know how tough the opposition is here in WEC.”
Bernhard set a time just 0.024s quicker than his teammate Brendon Hartley in the car to confirm the 919 Hybrid’s superiority in qualifying trim.
Nico Hulkenberg will start his endurance racing debut from second place as he and teammate Nick Tandy finished the session just 0.258s behind the sister #17 Porsche. The #18 car of Romain Dumas/Marc Lieb and Neel Jani will start third.
The closest challengers to Porsche were again Audi, with its R18 e-tron quattros in fourth and fifth respectively with the low-drag-spec LMP1 cars.
Toyota struggled in the qualifying period and was nowhere near the pace of the Porsche and Audi LMP1 cars. The #1 and #2 cars will start sixth and seventh respectively, but are expected to have better race pace than they showed in Silverstone.
More success for G-Drive in LMP2
G-Drive Racing celebrated a second pole in as many races in LMP2 with Julien Canal and Sam Bird setting the best average two laps of 2m07.761s in the Ligier JS P2.
The KCMG ORECA 05 of Matt Howson and Nicolas Lapierre will start second in class. The Nissan-powered LMP2 coupe were in P1 going in to the final stages but were ultimately outpaced by Canal’s times on fresh tyres in the final few laps. The gap between the top two in class was just 0.3s.
Aston double in LMGTE
The #99 Aston Martin Vantage V8, driven by Fernando Rees and Richie Stanaway in qualifying, will start from pole position in the LMGTE Pro class. They beat the reigning champions Toni Vilander and Gianmaria Bruni in the #51 AF Corse Ferrari by just 0.070s, as the Ferrari took time to get its tyres up to optimum temperature.
The LMGTE Am class pole fell to the #98 Aston Martin Racing duo of Paul Dalla Lana and Pedro Lamy to make it a double pole celebration for the British constructor.
The Canadian/Portuguese pairing set an average of 2m19.578s, with an outright fastest time set by Lamy of 2m16.642s.
The 6 Hours of Spa is scheduled to take place tomorrow at 14.30 local time.
6 Hours of Spa – Qualifying times
N° Drivers Car Time 1 17 Timo Bernhard
Mark Webber
Brendon Hartley Porsche 1m54.767 2 19 Nico Hulkenberg
Earl Bamber
Nick Tandy Porsche 1m55.025 3 18 Romain Dumas
Neel Jani
Marc Lieb Porsche 1m55.284 4 7 Marcel Fassler
Andre Lotterer
Benoit Treluyer Audi 1m55.540 5 8 Lucas di Grassi
Loic Duval
Oliver Jarvis Audi 1m56.541 6 1 Anthony Davidson
Sebastien Buemi
Kazuki Nakajima Toyota 1m57.487 7 2 Alexander Wurz
Stephane Sarrazin
Mike Conway Toyota 1m57.929 8 9 Filipe Albuquerque
Marco Bonanomi
Rene Rast Audi 1m58.000 9 4 Simon Trummer
Vitantonio Liuzzi
Christian Klien CLM/AER 2m07.286 10 26 Roman Rusinov
Julien Canal
Sam Bird Ligier/Nissan 2m07.761 11 47 Matt Howson
Richard Bradley
Nicolas Lapierre ORECA/Nissan 2m07.970 12 43 Pierre Ragues
Oliver Webb
Zoel Amberg Morgan/SARD 2m08.055 13 28 Gustavo Yacaman
Luis Derani
Ricardo González Ligier/Nissan 2m08.258 14 38 Simon Dolan
Mitchell Evans
Harry Tincknell Gibson/Nissan 2m08.329 15 36 Nelson Panciatici
Paul-Loup Chatin
Vincent Capillaire Alpine/Nissan 2m08.901 16 30 Scott Sharp
Ryan Dalziel
David Hansson Ligier/HPD 2m09.989 17 42 Nick Leventis
Danny Watts
Jonny Kane Dome/Nissan 2m11.655 18 31 Ed Brown
Johannes van Overbeek
Jon Fogarty Ligier/HPD 2m16.721 19 99 Alex MacDowall
Fernando Rees
Richie Stanaway Aston Martin 2m16.840 20 51 Gianmaria Bruni
Toni Vilander Ferrari 2m16.910 21 97 Darren Turner
Stefan Mucke
Rob Bell Aston Martin 2m17.231 22 71 Davide Rigon
James Calado Ferrari 2m17.526 23 95 Christoffer Nygaard
Marco Sorensen
Jonathan Adam Aston Martin 2m17.757 24 91 Sven Muller
Kevin Estre Porsche 2m18.025 25 92 Frederic Makowiecki
Richard Lietz Porsche 2m18.038 26 35 Jacques Nicolet
Jean-Marc Merlin
Erik Maris Ligier/Nissan 2m18.487 27 98 Paul Dalla Lana
Pedro Lamy
Mathias Lauda Aston Martin 2m19.578 28 50 Gianluca Roda
Paolo Ruberti
Kristian Poulsen Chevrolet 2m20.694 29 88 Christian Ried
Kalid Al Qubaisi
Klaus Bachler Porsche 2m21.432 30 55 Duncan Cameron
Matt Griffin
Alex Mortimer Ferrari 2m21.893 31 83 François Perrodo
Emmanuel Collard
Rui Aguas Ferrari 2m21.958 32 72 Viktor Shaitar
Andrea Bertolini
Aleksey Basov Ferrari 2m22.909 33 77 Patrick Dempsey
Patrick Long
Marco Seefried Porsche 2m23.303 34 96 Frederico Castellacci
Roald Goethe
Stuart Hall Aston Martin 2m24.519
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