The #22 United Autosports Oreca LMP2 07 of Philip Hanson, Paul di Resta, and Jim McGuire went quickest in Free Practice 1 at Yas Marina Circuit on Friday afternoon.
One would never have guessed that the car had been in an accident less than 24 hours prior during a private test held last night. But after setting the quickest time in the Private Test Session this morning, Hanson backed it up with a top time of 1’42.821 to lead the LMP2 category.
Neel Jani went second-quickest in the #98 99 Racing Oreca, which he’ll share with Omani LMP2 newcomer Ahmad al Harthy. Malthe Jakobsen, now the sole professional driver in the #37 COOL Racing Oreca after Nico Lapierre stood down from his seat, was third in the session.
COOL Racing also led the LMP3 class with their #17 Ligier JS P320 driven by Cedric Oltramare, Adrien Chila, and Marcos Siebert – who set the benchmark time of 1’47.986 early in the session, over a second clear of the field.
Belen Garcia, the lone woman in the Asian Le Mans Series grid, went second-quickest in the #9 Graff Racing Ligier (with Eric Trouillet and Sebastian Page), and the #5 DKR Engineering Duquiene D08 of Valentino Catalano (with Tom van Rompuy) was third quickest in the class.
In the GT class, Luca Stolz went quickest in the black #7 Haupt Racing Team Mercedes-AMG GT3, posting a time of 1’53.429.
Brendon Leitch put the #19 Leipert Motorsport Lamborghini Huracán GT3 (with Gabriel Rindone/Marco Mapelli) in second, followed by the #10 GetSpeed Mercedes of Raffaele Marciello (with Fabian Schiller and Florian Scholze) in third. Six different manufacturers occupied the top seven positions in class.
After incidents in the morning test, the #77 D’station Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 and #63 Inter Europol Competition Ligier did not run, and the #2 CD Sport Ligier had just gone out on track for the first time before the session was red-flagged with less than seven minutes remaining.
