EL1 – Porsche leads the tests ahead of Audi

The Porsche 919 Hybrids set the best times in the first practice session for the 6 Hours of the Nürburgring, which was briefly interrupted due to communications problems between the marshals and the teams. It was Marc Lieb who set the benchmark by completing a lap of the German circuit in 1'41''703 at the wheel of the No. 2 which preceded by four hundredths the No. 1 driven by Brendon Hartley.

The Audi R18s follow a few tenths behind. The No. 7 of André Lotterer is two tenths behind while the No. 8 follows less than half a second away with a time achieved by Loïc duval.

The Toyota TS050 Hybrid are further back. Sébastien Buemi placed the No. 5 almost nine tenths back while the No. 6 follows about two seconds behind with Kamui Kobayashi.

Dominik Kraihamer set the best private LMP1 time with a lap of 1:48 in the Rebellion R-One.

In LMP2, the benchmark was set by the No. 05 G-Drive Racing Oreca 26-Nissan with a time of 1:50 signed by Alex Brundle. Matt Howson was closest, almost seven tenths behind in the No. 748 Oreca 05-Nissan of Manor. The #44 Gibson 015S from Strakka Racing completes the top three with Jonny Kane who preceded the #42 Ligier JS P2-Nissan from ESM with Luis Felipe Derani. L'Alpine A460 n°36 from Menezes-Stone-Richelmi only completed four laps.

James Calado was the fastest in GTE Pro by setting a time of 1’58”402 on the Ferrari 488 n°51 from AF Corse which was ahead of the Aston Martin Vantage V8 by Darren Turner and Nicki Thiim. The second AF Corse Ferrari led by Sam Bird follows a second just ahead of the No. 66 Ford GT of Stefan Mücke.

Pedro Lamy set the best time in GTE Am with a lap in 1'59''949 in the No. 8 Vantage V98 which preceded Paolo Ruberti's Larbre Competition Corvette C7 Z06 by eight tenths.

The second practice session for the 6 Hours of the Nürburgring will take place from 16:30 p.m.

Results of free practice 1 of the 6 Hours of the Nürburgring