6 Hours of Spa – FP1: WRT ahead of the two United Autosports

The first Free Practice session for the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps was delayed by fifteen minutes following an FIA sensor problem. This first hour and a half session this weekend and the only one contested this Thursday was for a long time dominated by the local Team WRT team with the No. 07 Oreca 31 of Sean Gelael, Robin Frijns and René Rast. The Belgian team retained first place until the end, setting the best time in 2:05.475, to beat the two United Autosports USA cars. In the American team, it was the #22 of Phil Hanson, Filipe Albuquerque and William Owen which took over the sister car, the #23 of Alexander Lynn, Oliver Jarvis and Joshua Pierson. The gap between the first two overall was minimal since only 0.083 seconds separated them.

Les Hypercars sont restées en retrait pour cette première sortie du week-end. Dans la catégorie reine, c’est la Glickenhaus n°708 d’Olivier Pla, Romain Dumas et Pipo Derani qui a signé le meilleur chrono en 2:08.233. Cela n’était cependant que le cinquième temps au classement général. Les Toyota ont complété le podium de cette classe, mais aux huitièmes et treizièmes rangs, respectivement occupés par la n°7 (Mike conway, Kamui Kobayashi, Jose Maria Lopez) and n°8 (Sébastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley, Ryo Hirakawa). L'Alpine A480 n°36 (Andre Black, Nicolas lapierre, Matthieu Vaxiviere) took fourteenth place, just under two seconds behind the best time overall.

Porsche dominates in GTE

The Porsche ont dominé le chrono dans les deux catégories GTE. La 911 RSR – 19 n°92 du constructeur allemand (Michael Christensen, Kevin Estre) a ainsi établi la meilleure marque en GTE Pro en 2:14.583 devant la n°91 (Gianmaria Bruni, Richard Lietz) en 2:14.908. La Ferrari 488 n°51 from AF Corse (Alessandro Pier Guidi, James Calado) took third place in 2:16.601. In GTE Am, it was the #46 of Team Project 1 (Matteo Cairoli, Mikkel Pedersen, Nicolas Leutwiller) who set the best time in 2:16.982. L'Aston Martin Vantage AMR n°33 of TF Sport (Ben Keating, Henrique Chaves, Marco Sørensen) and the second Porsche of Team Project 1 (Brendan Iribe, Oliver Millroy, Ben Barnicoat) took second and third places. 

Find the Free Practice 1 rankings HERE

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