Toyota Gazoo Racing took the top two positions ahead of the World Endurance Championship’s 6 Hours of Spa with Kamui Kobayashi setting the fastest qualifying lap.
The #7 team of Kobayashi, Mike Conway and Jose Maria Lopez will start the first race of the WEC superseason from pole position after setting an average time of 1m54.583.
The team’s closest competitor was the #8 Toyota team of Kazuki Nakajima, Sebastien Buemi and Fernando Alonso, with the average of the laps set by Alonso and Nakajima 0.379s slower.
The qualifying session for LMP1 and LMP2 classes was red flagged twice, with the second red flag being a lengthy stop after the #10 Dragonspeed LMP1 car – at the time being driven by Pietro Fittipaldi – crashed hard into the tyre barrier at Eau Rouge. Fittipaldi was taken to the hospital after the incident.
The second row of the LMP1 grid was taken over by Rebellion Racing. The #1 team, who went fastest in the final practice session earlier in the day, qualified in third with Bruno Senna setting their final lap time.
The #3 team of Thomas Laurent, Mathias Beche and Gustavo Menezes will start the 6 Hours of Spa in fourth place.
SMP Racing’s #11 car with Mikhail Aleshin and Vitaly Petrov was able to get ahead of the #4 Bykolles Racing Team after the session restarted. Stephane Sarrazin in SMP Racing’s #17 car was the cause of the first red flag after he stopped on the Kemmel Straight.
The top two cars in the LMP2 class were separated by just 0.024s, with Signatech Alpine Matmut clinching pole position for the class thanks to Nicolas Lapierre and Pierre Thiriet. G-Drive Racing missed out but will start second in class.
The two Jackie Chan DC Racing entries will start third and fourth in class. The #37 car set the fastest lap between the two entries, but the #38 team had the better average by 0.199s.
Ford Chip Ganassi Team clinched both front row slots in the LMGTE Pro class, with the #67 entry of Tony Kanaan, Harry Tincknell and Andy Priaulx getting the better of the #66 team by less than one-tenth of a second.
The #91 Porsche GT entry with Gianmaria Bruni tried to set another lap late on during the LMGTE qualifying session but wasn’t able to improve from third place. The team’s average was only 0.004s slower than the #66 team.
Porsche also took fourth place with its #92 team.
Antonio Felix da Costa on BMW’s #82 entry moved up to fifth in the last minute of qualifying, bumping the AF Corse #51 squad of James Calado and Allesandro Pier Guidi down to sixth.
Dempsey-Proton Racing will start in first for the LMGTE Am class with its #77 team after qualifying ahead of Aston Martin Racing by 0.002s.
