Chatin places IDEC Sport on pole at the Red Bull Ring

Already in pole position during the opening of the European Le Mans Series (ELMS) season at Le Castellet (Var) last spring, the IDEC Sport team did it again on Saturday in Austria. On the circuit of Red Bull Rings, Paul-Loup Chatin was the fastest at the wheel of the Oreca 07-Gibson and allowed his teammates Paul Lafargue and Memo Rojas to start on pole in the 4-hour race.

IDEC SPORT takes pole position #4hrbr @EuropeanLMS @paulloup_chatin @memorojas15 @paul pic.twitter.com/NmgcZbuEsS

— IDEC SPORT Racing (@IDECSportRacing) July 21, 2018

The champion ELMS 2015 is just 19 hundredths ahead of another Oreca, that of Duqueine Engineering (Pierre Ragues-Nicolas Jamin-Nelson Panciatici). The winners of Castellet, the Spaniards of Racing Engineering, will start on the second row (Norman Naton-Olivier Pla-Paul Petit 3rd). All fresh Formula E champion with Techeetah, Jean-Éric Vergne (G-Drive Racing) will start fifth with Roman Rusinov and Andrea Pizzitola.

In category LM P3, former single-seater driver Mikkel Jensen (AT Racing Ligier) was demoted from pole due to failure to respect track limits and is replaced by Mathieu Layahe (Ultimate Norma).

The tension rises as we will finally go GREEN tomorrow at the @redbullring_! #ELMS | #4HRBR pic.twitter.com/EhpZ3TIckN

— ELMSeries_Official (@EuropeanLMS) July 21, 2018

On the side of Grand Touring, JMW Motorsport, champion in LM GTE last year, was the fastest in testing thanks to Miguel Molina on the Ferrari 488 GTE. The Spaniard lapped only 98 thousandths less than Matteo Cairoli on the Porsche 911 RSR of the Proton Competition.

The start of the 4 Hours of the Red Bull Ring is scheduled for around noon and will be followed via live video.