Shanghai WEC: Toyota claims another front row lockout

Kamui Kobayashi and Mike Conway took pole position at the end of a session in which Toyota came under pressure in qualifying for the first time of the 2018/19 WEC superseason. 

They ended up with a 1m42.931s average in the #7 Toyota TS050 Hybrid, which was only three tenths up on the #1 Rebellion-Gibson R-13 qualified by Bruno Senna and Andre Lotterer. 

Kobayashi's first-run time of 1m43.329s edged out teammate Fernando Alonso by three tenths before Conway posted a 1m43.155s to go just two hundredths quicker than Kazuki Nakajima. 

Both Kobayashi and Alonso then went again, the Japanese driver going four tenths quicker than his teammate on the way to the fastest time of the session, a 1m42.708s.

That meant Kobayashi and Conway finished with a 1m42.931s average, four tenths up on Alonso and Nakajima's 1m43.139s.

Lotterer also went again on a fresh set of rubber and found seven tenths to improve to a 1m42.869s to lower the #1 Rebellion's average to 1m43.218s.

Kobayashi said: "The track was improving and Mike did a great lap, so I went again, which was important because it was quite tight at the end."

SMP Racing's lead BR Engineering BR1 qualified by Stephane Sarrazin and Egor Orudzhev took fourth with a 1m43.879s average, three tenths up on the fifth-placed #3 Rebellion of Mathias Beche and Thomas Laurent. 

The DragonSpeed BR1 driven by Ben Hanley and Renger van der Zande edged out the second of the AER-engined SMP cars qualified by Jenson Button and Vitaly Petrov for sixth.

The Jackie Chan DC Racing squad took the LMP2 pole with Gabriel Aubry and Ho-Pin Tung.

They ended up on a 1m48.888s average aboard their Jota-run Oreca 07, which put them a quarter of a second up on the sister car qualified by Nabil Jeffri and Jazeman Jaafar. 

Nicolas Lapierre set the fastest P2 time of the session in the Signatech Oreca on a 1m48.598s, but Pierre Thiriet ended up more than three seconds slower after a spin. 

That dropped them to fourth behind the DragonSpeed Oreca qualified by Pastor Maldonado and Roberto Gonzalez.

Ford pips BMW to GTE pole

Ford claimed a last-gasp pole position in GTE Pro after Stefan Mucke went out for a second run in the car he shares with Olivier Pla. 

The German found over a second with a 1m56.464s lap aboard the #66 Ford GT to snatch pole away from the BMW M8 GTE of Nicky Catsburg and Martin Tomczyk. 

The Ford duo ended up on 1m58.627s average, which was two tenths clear of the BMW drivers' 1m58.874s.

Maxime Martin and Alex Lynn took third in the best of the  Aston Martin Vantage GTEs with a 1m59.000s, which was just three hundredths faster than the lead Porsche 911 RSR of Michael Christensen and Kevin Estre. 

Antonio Felix da Costa and Tom Blomqvist ended up fifth in the second MTEK BMW. 

The two AF Corse Ferraris took ninth and 10th places, qualifying only ahead of the Chevrolet Corvette C7.R.

Pedro Lamy and Paul Dalla Lana claimed their fifth consecutive GTE Am pole position at Shanghai for Aston Martin.

LMP qualifying results:

Pos.	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Avg Time	Gap
1	7	Kamui Kobayashi   Mike Conway   Jose Maria Lopez	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	1'42.931
2	8	Fernando Alonso   Kazuki Nakajima   Sébastien Buemi	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	1'43.159	0.228
3	1	Andre Lotterer   Bruno Senna   Neel Jani	Rebellion R13	LMP1	1'43.218	0.287
4	17	Stéphane Sarrazin   Matevos Isaakyan   Egor Orudzhev	BR Engineering BR1	LMP1	1'43.870	0.939
5	3	Mathias Beche   Thomas Laurent   Gustavo Menezes	Rebellion R13	LMP1	1'44.179	1.248
6	10	Renger van der Zande   Ben Hanley   James Allen	BR Engineering BR1	LMP1	1'44.612	1.681
7	11	Jenson Button   Vitaly Petrov   Mikhail Aleshin	BR Engineering BR1	LMP1	1'44.789	1.858
8	4	Oliver Webb   Tom Dillmann   James Rossiter	ENSO CLM P1/01	LMP1	1'46.353	3.422
9	38	Ho-Pin Tung   Stéphane Richelmi   Gabriel Aubry	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'48.888	5.957
10	37	Nabil Jeffri   Weiron Tan   Jazeman Jaafar	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'49.138	6.207
11	31	Anthony Davidson   Pastor Maldonado   Roberto Gonzalez	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'49.857	6.926
12	36	Nicolas Lapierre   Pierre Thiriet   Andre Negrao	Alpine A470	LMP2	1'50.206	7.275
13	28	Loic Duval   François Perrodo   Matthieu Vaxiviere	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'51.006	8.075
14	29	Giedo van der Garde   Nyck de Vries   Frits van Eerd	Dallara P217	LMP2	1'51.657	8.726
15	50	Enzo Guibbert   Romano Ricci   Erwin Creed	Ligier JSP 217	LMP2	1'51.925	8.994

GTE qualifying:

Pos.	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Avg Time	Gap
1	81	Nick Catsburg   Martin Tomczyk	BMW M8 GTE	LMGTE PRO	1'58.441
2	66	Stefan Mücke   Olivier Pla	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	1'58.464	0.023
3	97	Maxime Martin   Alex Lynn	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE PRO	1'58.832	0.391
4	92	Michael Christensen   Kevin Estre	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	1'58.801	0.360
5	82	Antonio Felix da Costa   Tom Blomqvist	BMW M8 GTE	LMGTE PRO	1'59.012	0.571
6	95	Nicki Thiim   Marco Sorensen	Aston Martin Vantage AMR	LMGTE PRO	1'59.144	0.703
7	67	Harry Tincknell   Andy Priaulx	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	1'58.914	0.473
8	91	Gianmaria Bruni   Richard Lietz	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	1'59.258	0.817
9	51	James Calado   Alessandro Pier Guidi	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	1'59.401	0.960
10	71	Sam Bird   Davide Rigon	Ferrari 488 GTE EVO	LMGTE PRO	1'59.359	0.918
11	64	Oliver Gavin   Tommy Milner	Chevrolet Corvette C7R	LMGTE PRO	1'59.802	1.361
12	98	Pedro Lamy   Paul Dalla Lana   Mathias Lauda	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE AM	2'00.880	2.439
13	77	Christian Ried   Matt Campbell  Julien Andlauer	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	2'01.528	3.087
14	54	Giancarlo Fisichella   Francesco Castellacci   Thomas Flohr	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	2'00.281	1.840
15	88	Matteo Cairoli  Riccardo Pera  Khaled Al Qubaisi	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	2'00.128	1.687
16	90	Jonathan Adam   Salih Yoluc   Charles Eastwood	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE AM	2'02.020	3.579
17	61	Matthew Griffin   Mok Weng Sun   Keita Sawa	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	2'00.804	2.363
18	56	Jörg Bergmeister   Patrick Lindsey   Egidio Perfetti	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	2'01.357	2.916
19	86	Michael Wainwright   Benjamin Barker  Thomas Preining	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE AM	2'01.155	2.714
20	70	Olivier Beretta   Eddie Cheever III   Motoaki Ishikawa	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	2'01.309	2.868