Nielsen Racing’s Alex Quinn was fastest in the opening Free Practice session of the 2025/26 Asian Le Mans Series, which was held at the Sepang International Circuit this afternoon.
On his third flying lap of the 90-minute session, the Briton set a blistering 1:53.362 aboard Nielsen’s #64 ORECA 07 – Gibson, surpassing the early benchmark of DKR Engineering’s Mathias Beche.
Beche’s time, a 1:55.191, was good enough to hold onto second position aboard the #3 ORECA, albeit a mammoth 1.829 seconds behind Quinn.
Mikkel Jensen was third fastest in the #5 United Autosports ORECA, ahead of the #88 Proton Competition entry in the hands of Lorenzo Fluxa, and Charles Milesi aboard the #47 Cetilar Racing ORECA.
Proton Competition’s #22 ORECA was sixth, ahead of the ##70 Vector Sport RLR, #20 Algarve Pro Racing, #49 High Class Racing and #25 Algarve Pro Racing entries.
In LMP3, Matteo Quintarelli was fastest for series debutant 23Events Racing, after setting a 2:03.051 aboard its #23 Ligier JS P325 – Toyota.
Quintarelli was 0.295 seconds ahead of the #29 Forestier Racing by VPS Ligier of Luciano Morano, with Matus Ryba third in the second 23Events Racing Ligier, the #71.
Narain Karthikeyan was fourth in the #1 Team Virage Ligier, ahead of the sister #8 entry of Vic Stevens, whilst defending champion Bretton Racing completed the top six with its #26 Ligier courtesy of a time from Lucas Fluxa.
And in GT, the return of the Ecurie Ecosse name got off to a strong start, with the #56 Ecurie Ecosse Blackthorn Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 Evo quickest in the hands of Kobe Pauwels.
The Belgian set 2:07.395 on his second flying lap of the session, with the fastest times across all three classes being set inside the opening 10 minutes of FP1.
Dennis Marschall was second in the #74 Kessel Racing Ferrari 296 GT3, 0.181 seconds behind Pauwels, with the #87 Origine Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) of Ye Hongli third.
Defending champion Manthey, and its #10 Porsche, was fourth fastest with Loek Hartog behind the wheel, ahead of the #37 QMMF by GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO of Lucas Auer and Mathieu Detry’s #28 UNX Racing by Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 Evo.
FP1 ran green throughout, and 46 of the 47 runners completed at least one timed lap, with the exception being the #43 Inter Europol Competition LMP2, which pitted following an installation run from Georgios Kolovos and failed to reappear due to an alternator problem.
The Polish outfit’s #13 Ligier LMP3 also had limited track time, turning only 12 laps due to engine woes. Following an engine change triggered by a hole in the block yesterday, the throttle body failed six laps in, with the replacement part then proceeding to fail immediately.
Elsewhere, Antonio Fuoco and Alessandro Pier Guidi are both absent from today’s running, with the pair of Ferrari factory drivers attending the FIA Gala in Tashkent.
Free Practice at the Sepang International Circuit continues with a further 90 minutes of running later today, which will begin at 16:00 MST, though in the immediate aftermath of the all-dry FP1, the rain started to fall heavily around the circuit.
Image courtesy of Nielsen Racing
