After trailing the two Audi R18s in the first 90-minute Free Practice session for the 6 Hours of Shanghai earlier today, the two Porsche 919 Hybrids returned to the top of the timing screens this afternoon, with the no17 Porsche of Mark Webber, Timo Bernhard and Brendon Hartley posting the quickest time of the day. The 1m45.111 lap, posted by Webber early in the session, was over 2 seconds quicker than the current lap record, a 1m47.442 lap set by Allan McNish in 2013. The Australian’s lap was also 0.240s ahead of his teammates, Neel Jani, Marc Lieb and Romain Dumas in the no18 919 Hybrid.
The two Audi R18s were 3rd and 4th on the timesheets with the no8 Audi of Duval, di Grassi and Jarvis improving the best time in the morning session by 0.8 seconds to finish the afternoon with a best lap of 1m45.930, 0.157s ahead of the no7 R18 of Lotterer, Fässler and Treluyer. The two Toyotas were once again 5th and 6th fastest with the no2 TS040 HYBRID ahead of the no1 Toyota by 0.5 seconds.
The no13 Rebellion Racing R-One was the lead car in the privateer class, improving its best time in the morning session by 1.6 seconds with Alex Imperatori setting a 1m50.790. He finished the session 0.7 seconds ahead of the no12 AER powered R-One and 3.2 seconds in front of the Bykolles CLM-AER.
In LMP2 the no47 KCMG ORECA 05-Nissan set the pace once again with a 1m54.185s lap set by Nick Tandy, an improvement of nearly one second on the morning session and a tenth of a second ahead of the no36 Signatech Alpine of Nelson Panciatici, Paul-Loup Chatin and WEC newcomer Tom Dillmann.
The no28 G-Drive Racing Ligier was 3rd fastest in LMP2, followed by the no42 Strakka Racing Gibson, the no43 Team SARD Morand Morgan Evo in 4th and 5th places respectively.
The third Free Practice session will take place tomorrow morning at 09:00 (local) and will last for 60-minutes. Later in the day the competitors qualify in two separate sessions, LMGTE and LMP, to determine the grid for Sunday’s race.
CLICK HERE for the results from FP2
