FIA GT Championship

Total 24 Hours of Spa: Qualifying 3 Report

© Planetlemans - Brecht Decancq

The third and final qualifying session for this weekend’s Total 24 Hours of Spa took place between 12:50 and 13:35 today. Cloudy skies greeted the FIA GT drivers today as the teams went out to try and beat the pole time of 2:14.581 set by Jetalliance Racing’s Karl Wendlinger last night.

Miguel Ramos was the first to set a fast lap time in the session as he set a 2:14.934 early on. This moved the #2 Vitaphone Maserati MC12 from eight to third on the grid. Other teams started to realise that improvements were possible and went out as well.

The first car to beat Ramos’ time was Marcel Fässler in the #6 Phoenix Corvette. The Swiss driver stopped the clocks in 2:14.815 which was good enough for third place and one lap later he improved his fastest time by setting a 2:14.669. As a result the Corvette moved into second place on the provisional grid.

Fifteen minutes before the end of the session the McDonald’s Racing Porsche GT2-R went off at turn one, bringing out the red flag not much later. Fortunately a few minutes later the track was cleared and the session was restarted.

With just over eight minutes to go Pedro Lamy went on a mission that was aborted yesterday when Bouchut crashed. The Portuguese driver took to the track in the Larbre Competition Saleen S7R and really flew around the circuit. As he finished his flying lap the clock stopped at 2:14.287, three tenths of a second quicker than the provisional pole at that moment.

Marcel Fässler did his best to get pole and improved his best lap time with just four minutes to go. A 2:14.492 was however not yet enough to beat Lamy, but it was at least quicker than Wendlinger’s time. On his next flying lap he went even faster in the first two sectors, but a slower third sector time meant he did not beat the Portuguese driver.

With just one minute to go Lamy did get quicker however. As he crossed the line the timing showed 2:13.923, which was another three tenths quicker than his previous fastest lap time. Fässler improved once more and set a 2:14.246, quicker than Lamy’s second best time, but not enough for pole position.

After the chequered flag came out it was clear that no other car would be able to beat the time set by Pedro Lamy, giving Larbre Competition its first pole position of the season!