Franck Perera took a somewhat unexpected pole position in the Pro-Am-class #93 Pro GT by Almeras Porsche 911 for this afternoon’s three-hour Blancpain Endurance Series race at Silverstone.
The last of the three 15-minute qualifying segments was brought to a premature end when Romain Brandela crashed the #41 Sport Garage Ferrari 458 heavily at Vale. The timing couldn’t have been worse for most of the front-runners, who were gearing up for their final flying laps at the time.
Perera has shown good speed throughout free practice, though, and should definitely be a factor in the early stages of the race before hands over to co-driver Eric Dermont. “Last year we went well here, too,” the Frenchman said, “and I was here a few weeks ago for ELMS. I like this track, I have lots of experience here in GTs and single-seaters, so I was pretty confident going into qualifying and I’m confident for the race, too.”
Second on the grid, and first of the Pro Cup runners, was Monza polesitter and race winner Alvaro Parente in the #98 ART Grand Prix McLaren 12C. The Portuguese ace was one of those with another lap still to run when the reds came out. “I’m not sure if I would have gone quicker,” he said afterwards, “On this track in our car you have one lap to get the best of the tyres. On my earlier flier I passed two cars, so that maybe held me up a tiny bit, but on the lap after that I was already getting more oversteer, so I don’t think we would have got pole.”
It was a different story at RJN Nissan, however, where Alex Buncombe felt sure he was on a pole position lap when the flags were waved. “It’s good to be second in Pro-Am and third overall,” he said. “But it was a shame to get the red flag. As a driver, you always think you can go a bit quicker, and that was what happened on my final lap when the session was stopped. We were fastest here last year, but it’s a long race, the car feels nice, so it’s good.”
Bentley has once again shown good pace here, and the #7 car of Steven Kane, Guy Smith and Andy Meyrick is once again outperforming the #8. Kane’s effort in Q3 sees the Continental GT3 line up fourth on the grid. “It’s really good for us,” he beamed. “The car was great, despite not having much time to tweak the setup in the dry conditions. We haven’t really done much running at this track overall, and it’s always very difficult when you come to a new track anyway. But again the car performed really well – it works so well in all conditions. If I had completed my last lap I would have been on pole, which is good, so now we just need to make some small changes before the race and drive well through all the stints.”
Gregory Guilvert put the #26 Sainteloc Audi fifth, ahead of Kevin Estre in the other ART McLaren. Seventh went to the Kessel Racing Ferrari of Alessandro Bonacini. Eight was Bernd Schneider in the #84 HTP Motorsport Mercedes SLS, while the ninth-place MP Motorsport Aston Martin was also third-quickest Pro-Am.
The early red flag hit Laurens Vanthoor in the #1 WRT Audi particularly hard – he starts down in 10th, while another Pro-Am Aston, the Beechdean car, is 11th.
Gentlemen Trophy pole position was taken by the #51 AF Corse Ferrari of Filipe Barreiros, Peter Mann and Francisco Guedes – the latter driver setting the time.
A few minor patches of damp lingered on the track from overnight rain, but bright and sunny conditions prevailed throughout qualifying. Times tumbled from one session to the other, with Mark Poole’s Q1 benchmark of 2:06.283 a full five seconds off Kevin Estre’s fastest time in Q2 (2:01.653) and Perera going almost a second quicker again to take pole in Q3.
Brandela’s crash look likely to rule the Sport Garage Ferrari out of this afternoon’s race. There were no other major incidents in qualifying, although Karim Oijeh did bring out the red flags a few seconds before the Q1 chequered was due to fall when he beached the #15 Boutsen Ginion McLaren in the gravel.
Stephen Errity & Stephen Kilbey
