WEC Spa: Ferrari beats Porsche to pole, top Toyota in seventh after lengthy delay
Fuoco took the top spot by almost exactly half a second at the wheel of the #50 Ferarri 499P Le Mans Hypercar in the 12-minute Hyperpole session for the fastest 10 cars in the first round of qualifying.
The Italian’s 2m02.600s lap of the Circuit de Spap-Francorchamps pushed Porsche driver Matt Campbell down to second.
Campbell hung onto a spot on the front row of Saturday’s Spa 6 Hours with a 2m03.107s in his Porsche 963 LMDh despite a late improvement from the Ganassi-run Cadillac V-Series.R LMDh in the hands of Alex Lynn.
The Briton ended up just eight hundredths shy of the Porsche with a 2m03.115s.
Porsches took position four to six on the grid, the privateer 963s from Proton Competition and Jota edging out the second factory Porsche Penske Motorsport entry.
Julien Andlauer’s 2m03.314s in the Proton car gave him a margin of seven hundredths over Callum Ilott’s 2m03.384s in the best of Jota cars, with Kevin Estre in the works entry a further sixth hundredths in arrears on 2m03.448s.
Brendon Hartley took seventh in the only Toyota GR010 HYBRID LMH to make it through to Hyperpole.
Charles Milesi took seventh in the #35 Alpine A424 LMDh, while Robert Kubica and Robin Frijns rounded out the top 10 in their respective Ferrari and BMW M Hybrid V8 LMDh Hypercar class entries.
The top 13 cars in the first round of qualifying lasting 15 minutes were covered by less than a second.
Among the casualties from the opening period were Le Mans 24 Hours winner James Calado in the #51 Ferrari.
His trailed team-mate Fuoco by half a second on the way to 11th position, leaving him one place shy of a place in Hyperpole.
Bovy puts Iron Dames Lamborghini on LMGT3 pole
#85 Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracan LMGT3 Evo2: Sarah Bovy, Rahel Frey, Michelle Gatting
#85 Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracan LMGT3 Evo2: Sarah Bovy, Rahel Frey, Michelle Gatting
Photo by: Marco Losi / KAPPAEMEDIA
Sarah Bovy took her first LMGT3 pole position of the season for the Iron Dames squad.
She posted two laps good enough for pole aboard the Iron Lynx-run Lamborghini Huracan LM3 EVO2, her best of 2m20.755s giving her a margin of four-tenths over United Autosports McLaren driver Josh Caygill.
The Briton got down to a 2m21.092s aboard his McLaren 720S GT3 Evo to end up just four hundredths up on Ahmad Al Harthy in the fastest of the WRT BMW M4 GT3s.
Yasser Shahin took fourth for the Manthey EMA Porsche squad ahead of James Cottingham and Ian James in their respective United Autosports McLaren and Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 entries.
The 12-minute Hyperpole session for the LMGT3 cars was interrupted when Aliaksandr Malykhin crashed heavily at Raidillon in the Manthey PureRxcing Porsche.
The Belarusian lost the 911 RSR in the righthander at the fast sequence and hit the barriers backwards.
The British-based driver managed to get out of the car unaided before his transfer to the circuit medical centre.
David Leung, part of the winning LMGT3 line-up last time out at Imola, failed to make it through to the Hyperpole session, the Briton ending up 13th in the times.
The Spa 6 Hours, round three of the 2024 WEC, starts at 13:00 local time on Saturday.
WEC Spa – Qualifying results: