Toyota clinches pole at Fuji; Aston Martin top in LMGTE Pro
The headlines from qualifying at Fuji, round 4 of the WEC 2018-2019 Super Season.
13/10/2018
No.31 DragonSpeed ORECA 07 Gibson - pole winner in LMP2
The No.8 Toyota Gazoo Racing LMP1 car of Fernando Alonso, Kazuki Nakajima and Sebastien Buemi will start from pole position for tomorrow’s 6 Hours of Fuji.
Alonso and Buemi initially qualified their car in second position after the No.7 Toyota TS050 HYBRID driven by Jose Maria Lopez and Kamui Kobayashi set the fastest combined time of 1m23.437s.
Lopez exceeded the pit lane speed limit during the session and his lap times were deleted meaning that they dropped to the back of the field. This elevated the No.8 car to a third pole position of the 2018 FIA WEC Super Season.
Starting from second position on the grid will be the No.1 Rebellion Racing R13-Gibson car driven by André Lotterer and Neel Jani in qualifying.
Now in third position is the the No.3 Rebellion car of Mathias Beche, Thomas Laurent and Gustavo Menezes.
Marco Sørensen (left) and Nicki Thiim
LMGTE Pro pole goes to No.95 Aston Martin Racing Vantage of Nicki Thiim and Marco Sørensen – first for AMR in Pro since Shanghai last season and also maiden P1 for new model
Thiim sets fastest time of session on a 1m35.884s and Sørensen ensures unbeatable average of 1m36.093s
BMW Team MTEK complete best ever qualifying with Tom Blomqvist and Antonio Felix da Costa securing second position in No.82 M8 GTE
The British/Portuguese alliance combines to set an average of 1m36.275s
Good day for Aston Martin as they also take third with Maxime Martin and Alex Lynn setting an average of 1m36.362s
LMP2 pole goes to Anthony Davidson and Roberto Gonzalez for DragonSpeed
Anglo/Mexican pair set an average of 1m28.906 to claim first pole for American team
Second and third in LMP falls to Jackie Chan DC Racing as No.37 heads No.38 ORECA 07
Satoshi Hoshino from Dempsey Proton Racing
LMGTE Am sees second pole position of Super Season for Dempsey Proton Porsche as Matteo Cairoli and Satoshi Hoshino average 1m38.366s – the Japanese driver’s first race in the WEC
No.98 Aston Martin Racing car places second with Pedro Lamy and Paul Dalla Lana just 0.064s off pole
No.77 Dempsey Proton Porsche is third with Matt Campbell and Christian Ried qualifying
6 Hours of Fuji scheduled to start at 11.00 local time tomorrow