Nicolas Lapierre delivered a memorable performance for Alpine in the first qualifying session of the 2022 FIA WEC season at Sebring. The Frenchman secured pole position for Alpine after a 1:47.407 tour of the airfield circuit to secure the top spot in the team’s A480 Gibson.
Lapierre’s pole-setting lap was near-faultless, with no traffic, resulting in a 1.3 second gap between him and the nearest challenger for what was is the team’s first pole since the weekend in Portimao last season.
“It was a clean lap,” Lapierre said. “The conditions were different tonight but the setup changes we made worked. We have a great line up, a good team, here it’s difficult and with heat and traffic it’s going to be tough, but I am looking for it.
“Now we have to focus on doing the job tomorrow.”
To the surprise of many trackside, a Toyota GR010 HYBRID will not feature on the front-row, or even the top three for tomorrow’s race. Instead, Glickenhaus’ 007 LMH will line up alongside the Alpine after a strong performance from Olivier Pla, who pushed hard and set a best time of 1:48.741 for the US-flagged outfit.
With Toyota struggling to find outright speed, the best of the LMP2 runners ended up third. Danish ace Nicklas Nielsen pushed the leading GR010 to fourth on the grid, with a blistering 1:49.014 to take pole position in LMP2 for AF Corse right at the end of the session.
Brendon Hartley was the fastest of the two Toyota drivers in the session, putting the #8 fourth on the grid with a time 1.8 seconds off pole. The sister #7 will start a somewhat disappointing seventh.
United Autosports completed the top three in LMP2 and split the Toyotas, with Filipe Albuquerque in the #22 setting a best time of 1:49.388 to go fifth, two tenths up on Paul Di Resta in the #23. WRT and Realteam By WRT rounded out the top five in the class after hot laps from Rene Rast and Ferdinand Habsburg respectively.
The biggest incident of the session came from an LMP2 runner, Fabio Scherer bringing the LMH/LMP2 session to a premature end with a big off at Turn 1 in the Inter Europol ORECA. The 07 looked to have sustained significant damage from the impact, though thankfully Scherer was seen walking away.
̑In GTE Pro it was a Porsche front-row lockout, with Michael Christensen leading the way in the No. 92 911 RSR 19. The Dane set a 1:57.233 at the death of the session to push Gianmaria Bruni in the sister car down to second.
“I am fully confident of Michael. He always delivers when it counts, he did a great lap, it was good enough for pole. I always like to start on pole. We see the Corvette there, and the Ferrari we know they will be there at some point.” Christensen’s teammate Kevin Estre said after the session.
Corvette Racing’s C8.R will start behind the two Porsches, thanks to a 1:57.696 from team debutant Nick Tandy. AF Corse meanwhile, continued to struggle for outright pace after failing to challenge Porsche or Corvette during the practice sessions. James Calado and Antonio Fuoco were tasked with battling for pole, but neither could get within two seconds of the pole time. Instead, the #51 will start P5, with the #52 P6.
Perhaps the most remarkable story to emerge from the GTE session though, came in Am. Bronze-rated Ben Keating set a 1:59.204 to go fourth fastest on home soil and quicker than the two AF Corse Pro Ferraris. He will head into race day confident of a strong result after such a dominant performance for TF Sport and Aston Martin.
Paul Dalla Lana made it a 1-2 for Aston Martin, with a 2:00.570, the Canadian another one of the Bronze drivers to put in a strong performance in the short 10-minute shootout.
Brendan Iribe ended up third in Am in the #56 Team Project 1 Porsche, after sitting atop the times early in the session before red flags were brought out for an off for Nicolas Leutwiler in the sister Project 1 Porsche. The 911 ending up suffering rear-end damage as a result and didn’t rejoin the session.
The 2022 FIA WEC 1000 Miles of Sebring is set to get underway at 12:00pm local time tomorrow, the cars running into the darkness.
