In rain Audi Sweeps Front Row for 6H Silverstone

Audi drivers celebrate
Andre Lotterer, Marcel Fassler, Benoît Treluyer

Audi has established the best starting base for itself for the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) season opener in Silverstone. Car number “7" of Marcel Fassler/Andre Lotterer/Benoit Treluyer (CH/D/F) set the fastest time, trailed by Lucas di Grassi/Loic Duval/Oliver Jarvis (BR/F/GB) in number “8" with a gap of just one tenth of a second.

For Audi, it has been the twelfth occasion of setting the fastest time in the FIA WEC which has been held since 2012.

Snow in the morning and a stopped third free practice, wet tarmac and a track temperature of six degrees centigrade around noon: the conditions for the first qualifying session in the 2016 season were anything but ideal.

Still, Audi scored the first point of the season for setting the best time in the final qualifying session at Silverstone in the UK. “Congratulations to our driver squads and to the team on today’s performance," said Head of Audi Motorsport Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich. “Our team perfectly prepared the cars and our drivers made the best of these challenging conditions."

Their combined time was 0.104 seconds quicker than teammates Loic Duval and Lucas Di Grassi by 0.104 seconds.

Lotterer and Fassler’s top qualifying effort broke Porsche’s 11-race pole streak in WEC and marked the first pole for the German manufacturer since Fuji in 2013.

The 2013 World Champions will share the wheel of their new diesel-powered contender with Benoit Treluyer in Sunday’s season-opener.

Porsche was relegated to third and fourth on the grid, with the No. 1 Porsche 919 Hybrid of Mark Webber and Brendon Hartley only able to reel off a 1:54.150 average, which was nearly one-second slower than the Audi.

The sister Porsche 919 Hybrid, qualified by Neel Jani and Romain Dumas, was fourth, followed by the pair of Toyota TS050 Hybrids, which both battled boost issues in the session.

ByKolles Racing scored top qualifying honors in LMP1 Privateer, after at least one driver from each Rebellion R-One AER did not set laps in the 20-minute session.

A late flyer by Rene Rast, in drying conditions, saw G-Drive Racing score pole in the LMP2 class.

Rast and co-driver Roman Rusinov’s average of 2:08.479 put the Jota Sport-run squad on pole in its full-season debut. They’ll be joined at the wheel of the No. 26 Oreca 05 Nissan by Nathanael Berton on Sunday.

The No. 31 Tequila Patron ESM Ligier JS P2 Nissan qualified second, thanks to Pipo Derani and Chris Cumming’s 2:09.632 average.

Derani, meanwhile, set the session’s quickest single quickest lap, just 0.059 seconds quicker than Rast’s best.

The No. 43 RGR Sport by Morand Ligier Nissan will start third in class, with the pair of SMP Racing BR Engineering BR01 Nissans completing the top-five in class.

The Six Hours of Silverstone gets underway Sunday at 12 p.m. local time (7 a.m. ET) with live coverage on FOX Sports 1.

RESULTS: Qualifying

LMP

Pos No. Cat Driver Car T Driver 1 Driver 2 Average Gap
1 7 LMP1 Marcel FASSLER, Andre LOTTERER, Benoit TRELUYER Audi R18 M 1:53.201 1:53.207 1'53.204 +0.000s
2 8 LMP1 Lucas DI GRASSI, Loic DUVAL, Oliver JARVIS Audi R18 M 1:53.705 1:52.911 1'53.308 +0.104
3 1 LMP1 Timo BERNHARD, Mark WEBBER, Brendon HARTLEY Porsche 919 Hybrid M 1:54.635 1:53.666 1'54.150 +0.946
4 2 LMP1 Romain DUMAS, Neel JANI, Marc LIEB Porsche 919 Hybrid M 1:54.258 1:54.274 1'54.266 +1.062
5 6 LMP1 Stephane SARRAZIN, Mike CONWAY, Kamui KOBAYASHI Toyota TS050 – Hybrid M 1:58.815 1:57.586 1'58.200 +4.996
6 5 LMP1 Anthony DAVIDSON, Sebastien BUEMI, Kazuki NAKAJIMA Toyota TS050 – Hybrid M 2:03.360 1:56.859 2'00.109 +6.905
7 4 LMP1 Simon TRUMMER, Oliver WEBB, James ROSSITER CLM P1/01 – AER D 2:07.513 2:09.151 2'08.332 +15.128
8 26 LMP2 Roman RUSINOV, Nathanial BERTHON, Rene RAST Oreca 05 – Nissan D 2:09.584 2:07.374 2'08.479 +15.275
9 31 LMP2 Ryan DALZIEL, Luis Felipe DERANI, Christopher CUMMING LIGIER JS P2 – Nissan D 2:07.315 2:11.949 2'09.632 +16.428
10 43 LMP2 Ricardo GONZALEZ, Filipe ALBUQUERQUE, Bruno SENNA LIGIER JS P2 – Nissan D 2:08.576 2:12.015 2'10.295 +17.091
11 27 LMP2 Nicolas MINASSIAN, Maurizio MEDIANI, BR01 – Nissan D 2:10.164 2:11.091 2'10.627 +17.423
12 37 LMP2 Vitaly PETROV, Kirill LADYGIN, Victor SHAYTAR BR01 – Nissan D 2:11.507 2:10.540 2'11.023 +17.819
13 45 LMP2 Matthew RAO, Richard BRADLEY, Roberto MERHI Oreca 05 – Nissan D 2:13.097 2:10.689 2'11.893 +18.689
14 36 LMP2 Gustavo MENEZES, Nicolas LAPIERRE, Stephane RICHELMI Alpine A460 – Nissan D 2:12.141 2:12.302 2'12.221 +19.017
15 44 LMP2 Tor GRAVES, Will STEVENS, James JAKES Oreca 05 – Nissan D 2:13.901 2:12.309 2'13.105 +19.901
16 42 LMP2 Nick LEVENTIS, Danny WATTS, Jonny KANE Gibson 015S – Nissan D 2:09.931 2:17.527 2'13.729 +20.525
17 35 LMP2 David CHENG, Ho-Pin TUNG, Nelson PANCIATICI Alpine A460 – Nissan D 2:10.517 2:19.210 2'14.863 +21.659
18 30 LMP2 Scott SHARP, Ed BROWN, Johannes VAN OVERBEEK LIGIER JS P2 – Nissan D 2:11.832 2:28.988 2'20.410 +27.206
19 12 LMP1 Nicolas PROST, Nelson PIQUET JR, Nick HEIDFELD Rebellion R-One – AER D 2:07.841 2'07.841 +14.637

GT

Pos No. Cat Driver Car T Driver 1 Driver 2 Average Gap
1 71 LMGTE Pro Davide RIGON, Sam BIRD, Ferrari 488 GTE M 2:11.900 2:12.981 2'12.440 +0.000s
2 77 LMGTE Pro Richard LIETZ, Michael CHRISTENSEN, Porsche 911 RSR (2016) M 2:13.475 2:14.170 2'13.822 +1.382
3 66 LMGTE Pro Billy JOHNSON, Stefan MÃœCKE, Olivier PLA Ford GT M 2:14.791 2:14.160 2'14.475 +2.035
4 88 LMGTE Am Khaled AL QUBAISI, David HEINEMEIER HANSSON, Klaus BACHLER Porsche 911 RSR M 2:14.639 2:15.566 2'15.102 +2.662
5 67 LMGTE Pro Marino FRANCHITTI, Andy PRIAULX, Harry TINCKNELL Ford GT M 2:17.072 2:17.663 2'17.367 +4.927
6 78 LMGTE Am Christian RIED, Wolf HENZLER, Joel CAMATHIAS Porsche 911 RSR M 2:15.510 2:19.288 2'17.399 +4.959
7 50 LMGTE Am Yutaka YAMAGISHI, Pierre RAGUES, Paolo RUBERTI Chevrolet Corvette C7 M 2:14.044 2:22.644 2'18.344 +5.904
8 86 LMGTE Am Michael WAINWRIGHT, Adam CARROLL, Ben BARKER Porsche 911 RSR M 2:15.944 2:22.225 2'19.084 +6.644
9 83 LMGTE Am Francois PERRODO, Emmanuel COLLARD, Rui AGUAS Ferrari F458 Italia M 2:19.064 2:21.199 2'20.131 +7.691
10 97 LMGTE Pro Richie STANAWAY, Fernando REES, Aston Martin Vantage V8 D 2:19.683 2:22.499 2'21.091 +8.651
11 95 LMGTE Pro Nicki THIIM, Marco SØRENSEN, Darren TURNER Aston Martin Vantage V8 D 2:22.362 2:22.142 2'22.252 +9.812
12 98 LMGTE Am Paul DALLA LANA, Pedro LAMY, Mathias LAUDA Aston Martin Vantage V8 D 2:22.148 2:23.862 2'23.005 +10.565
13 51 LMGTE Pro Gianmaria BRUNI, James CALADO, Ferrari 488 GTE M 2:11.589 2'11.589 -0.851

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