Toyota on pole for the 6 Hours of Spa

It was at 18:20 p.m. that qualifying for the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps began with, as is customary, a first 10-minute session reserved for GTEs. As a reminder, it is no longer the average of the best laps signed by two drivers in the crew that are taken into account but a single time. A return to a classic pattern that we welcome. Furthermore, in GTE Am, it is now up to the gentlemen drivers to qualify the car.

But a few seconds after the start of the session reserved for GTEs, the session was stopped by a red flag. The cause: while driving the Porsche n°77 of Dempsey-Proton Racing, Christian Ried violently hit the piles of tires, on the right, at the top of the steep hill.

After a 15-minute interruption, the session was restarted. But same cause, same sentence: in exactly the same place, Egidio Perfetti also lost control of his No. 911 19 RSR-56 of Team Project 1 on the launch lap and resulted in a new red flag.

Both cars were seriously damaged. It remains to be seen whether Dempsey Proton Racing and Team Project 1 will be able to repair them for tomorrow.

Very lively since the start of the weekend, Kévin Estre has been in full swing in GTE Pro. Aligned in the No. 92 Porsche that he shares with Neel Jani, the Frenchman completed a lap in 2'11"219 and was 1"132 behind. Ferrari 488 GTE Evo n°52 by Miguel Molina. Followed by Richard Lietz (Porsche 911 RSR-19 no. 91), Alessandro Pier Guidi (Ferrari 488 GTE Evo no. 51) and Antonio Garcia (Corvette C8.R no. 63), who concedes almost two seconds to the reference of the category.

In GTE Am, pole position went unsurprisingly to Ben Keating, who is at the wheel of theAston Martin Vantage AMR n°33 from TF Sport. The American was almost a second behind Paul Dalla Lana (Aston Martin n°98), who himself was 0" ahead of Andrew Haryanto, entered in the Porche 6 RSR-911 n°19 of Dempsey-Proton Racing. . Thomas Flohr (Ferrari 88 GTE Evo no. 488) and François Perrodo (Ferrari 54 GTE Evo no. 488) complete the top 83.

It was finally only shortly after 19 p.m. that the Hypercar / LM P2 session could begin. Although manhandled during the Prologue and during the first two free practice sessions, the Toyota have resumed their good habits.

Credited with a lap in 2'00"747 at the wheel of the n°7, Kamui Kobayashi gave the GR010 Hybrid its first pole position. The Japanese was ahead of his compatriot by 0 Kazuki Nakajima, registered on the sister car.

THEAlpine A480 n°36 is only fourth at 1, ahead of the fastest of the LM P905s, namely the Oreca 2 n°07 of United Autosports entrusted this evening to Filipe Albuquerque, who only conceded 22” 1 in Kobayashi.

The leading fifth of the LM P2 is completed by Nyck de Vries (G-Drive Racing), Giedo van der Garde (Racing Team Nederland), Norman Nato (RealTeam) and Roberto Merhi (G-Drive Racing).

Tomorrow, the start of the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps will be at 13:30 p.m.