G-Drive Racing’s Aurus 01, fresh from its run at Spa in the WEC last weekend, topped the times in the opening Free Practice session of the ELMS weekend at Monza.
Job van Uitert topped the times with a 1:36.243 midway through the session, which was red-flagged moments before the end for the BHK ORECA having a minor off.
The Dutchman’s time was two tenths faster than the #28 IDEC Sport ORECA which ended up second and six tenths up on the Cool Racing ORECA after Nicolas Lapierre with a 1:36.884.
The biggest surprise of the session came from the Carlin garage. The British team, which is still very new to sportscars, ended up fourth with its Dallara P217, Ben Barnicoat setting a 1:37.156. This, after the team, struggled mightily to extract pace from its Dallara at Paul Ricard.
That run will go down well with Trevor Carlin’s team and bring them confidence ahead of qualifying and the race.
DragonSpeed’s ORECA completed the top five in LMP2.
In LMP3 it was Damiano Fioravanti who ran fastest, with a 1:44.908 in the Oregon Team Norma, which headed a 1-2-3-4 for the M30 in the session.
Nielsen Racing’s M30 ended up second thanks to Colin Noble (who was granted full BRDC membership prior to this weekend), the young Scot setting a 1:44.988.
The #19 M Racing Norma ended up third ahead of the #9 RealTeam Racing example.
The fastest of the Ligiers was the Eurointernational JS P3, which was rapid at Paul Ricard. It ended up fifth and with a 1:45.397, six tenths off the fastest time.
In GTE, which is now down to eight cars due to the #88 Proton Porsche’s late withdrawal, Team Project1’s 911 RSR topped the class, with a 1:48.075.
The JMW Ferrari ended up second, with the #77 Dempsey Proton Porsche completing the top three.
There were two FCYs in the sessions, for LMP2 cars stopping on track, the first for the High Class Racing ORECA, the second for the guest-entered Cetilar Racing Dallara.
Of note, every car aside from the #88 Proton Porsche turned laps in the session. This included the #31 Algarve Pro ORECA, a replacement chassis hastily built up after its incident in the Wednesday test.
FP2 for the ELMS is tomorrow at 9am, following the Bronze Test later today.
Photo courtesy of G-Drive Racing
