WTM Racing has secured its first outright pole position in the 24H SERIES for this weekend’s 12H SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS after a dominating run in qualifying.
The WTM Racing Ferrari 488 GT3 (#22, Georg Weiss / Leonard Weiss / Jochen Krumbach / Daniel Keilwitz) was quickest around the 7.004km Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps in all three 15-minute qualifying sessions, with Daniel Keilwitz setting the quickest lap time of all – a 2m 18.878s – during the final stint.
Scintillating pace from the German team meant their average lap time, by which the grid for tomorrow’s 12-hour race has been set, was just over two seconds quicker than its nearest rival.
“This is amazing!” a jubilant Leonard Weiss explained to radiolemans.com’s Joe Bradley. “This is my first pole position, here at Spa-Francorchamps, and I’m very happy. Daniel [Keilwitz], and of course the whole team, did an amazing job today. My own run was quite difficult: when I drove out of the pits, there was a lot of traffic, but when I finally found a gap in the last run, I pushed as hard as I could on the last lap, and fortunately it worked out. There’s going to be a little celebration this evening!
“There’s still a long way to go, but we’ll try our best, and hopefully we can keep this pace up during the race.”
A close fight for the final spot on the front row between the BoDa by Bas Koeten Racing Bentley Continental GT3 (#6, Bob Herber / Mark van der Aa) and the CP Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 (#85, Charles Putman / Charles Espenlaub / Shane Lewis) eventually went to the Bentley, with a strong final run from Mark van der Aa enough to keep CP’s Charles Espenlaub at bay.
Like WTM, the result marks the first time Bas Koeten Racing, and a Bentley, will start a 24H SERIES race from the overall front row in the GT division.
A fast lap in the closing moments saw the Herberth Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R (#91, Daniel Allemann / Ralf Bohn / Jürgen Häring) leapfrog its way to 4th on the grid, a little under two-tenths behind GT3-PRO/AM polesitter CP Racing. The top three qualifiers in GT3-AM will thus start from inside the
overall top four.
The Porsche 911 GT3 R of ‘GT3’ class polesitter EBM (#61, Adrian D’Silva / Tanart Sathienthirakul / Jeffrey Kingsley) will line up 5th overall for tomorrow’s race start, and will share the third row with the Car Collection Motorsport Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II (#34, Johannes Dr. Kirchhoff / Max Edelhoff / Tim Müller).
Audis monopolize the lower half of the overall top 10, with JUTA Racing’s EVO I (#71, Julius Adomavičius / Andrius Gelžinis / Jonas Gelžinis) lining up 7th overall just ahead of Hankook 12H MUGELLO runner-up, Phoenix Racing (#18, Michael Doppelmayr / Pierre Kaffer / Elia Erhart / Patryk Krupinski) and SAINTéLOC Racing (#26, Olivier Esteves / Pierre-Yves Paque / Christian Kelders / Simon Gachet). The latter two will compete with EVO II examples of the R8 LMS.
European 992 standings leader Red Ant Racing (#903, Ayrton Redant / Bert Redant / Yannick Redant) enjoyed a good start to its weekend with the fastest time of any Porsche 992 GT3 Cup runner, and the 10th fastest time overall. The sister #904 entry (Philippe Wils / Kurt Hensen) will start 3rd in-class and 14th overall, just one place behind 992-AM’s second fastest runner, HRT Performance (#929, Antti Buri / Kari-Pekka Laaksonen / Jim Rautiainen).
Despite suffering transponder issues shortly before the start of Q3, Van Berlo Motorsport by Bas Koeten Racing (#906, Marcel van Berlo / Bart van Helden / Glenn van Berlo) was able to fend off category rival, and series newcomer, E2P Racing (#910, Pablo Burguera / Manuel Cintrano / Ben Clucas) for 991-class pole position with its Porsche 911-II Cup.
In GTX, the returning Leipert Motorsport (#710, Kerong Li / Jean-Francois Brunot / Tyler Cooke) bested RD Signs – Siauliai racing team (#720, Audrius Butkevicius / Nicola Michelon / Paulius Paskevicius) on average by just half a second to take category pole position.
Both teams have registered a Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeo for this weekend. Despite spinning during the closing moments of Q3, Vortex V8 (#701, Lionel Amrouche / Philippe Bonnel / Sebastien Lajoux) rounds out the top three in GTX qualifying at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps.
On its first 24H SERIES start since 2018, the ALFAB Racing McLaren 570S GT4 (#400, Erik Behrens / Daniel Ros) secured GT4-class pole position ahead of series newcomer Buggyra ZM Racing (#416, Aliyyah Koloc / Yasmeen Koloc / Adam Lacko).
The Emirati team’s Mercedes-AMG GT4 meanwhile will line-up ahead of the Veidec Racing by JJ Motorsport BMW M4 GT4 (#422, Hakan Sari / Recep Sari / Arthur Peters).