Cetilar Racing’s Antonio Fuoco was quickest in the first Free Practice session of the 2026/27 Asian Le Mans Series season, with the 2024 24 Hours of Le Mans leading a Ferrari 1-2 at the Circuit Paul Ricard this morning.
After yesterday’s Prologue was cancelled due to adverse weather conditions, this was the first track time of the campaign, and for some drivers their first running aboard their new rides in any circumstance.
As such, an eager queue of LMP2 and GT machinery followed the pair of Ferrari 499P Hypercars out of the pit lane as soon as the session began, with the #47 Cetilar Racing Ferrari of Roberto Lacorte leading the field onto the circuit in the perfect picture of the series’ new Pro/Am Hypercar era.
After replacing Lacorte aboard this entry, Fuoco set a 1:51.114, which remained the best time of the session. This was 0.640 seconds faster than his FIA WEC co-driver Nicklas Nielsen in the #90 AF Corse Ferrari.
Nicolas Varrone made it an AF Corse 1-2-3 by topping LMP2 aboard the #83 ORECA 07 – Gibson, courtesy of a 1:52.353. The session wasn’t incident-free for the #83 ORECA, however, after Jeremy Clarke received a five-minute stop-and-go penalty for contact with the #33 2 Seas Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 EVO of Chris Lulham at Turn 15.
LMP2 debutant August Raber was second in class aboard the #30 Duqueine Team ORECA, 0.512 seconds behind Varrone, with Phil Hanson third in the #55 AF Corse ORECA.
The #24 Nielsen Racing entry of Scott Huffaker was fourth, ahead of Laurin Heinrich’s #4 CrowdStrike Racing by APR ORECA and Leo Robinson’s #16 Team Virage machine.
DKR Engineering’s #3 ORECA took more than 30 minutes to put a timed lap on the board, whilst the #34 Inter Europol Competition ORECA only turned a single lap all session.
In GT3, Tom Fleming was fastest in the #58 Garage 59 McLaren GT3 Evo. The Briton set a 2:02.512 towards the beginning of the 90-minute session, which went unchallenged throughout.
The #9 GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG of Fabian Schiller was second, 0.725 seconds behind, ahead of the #57 CarGuy Racing and #51 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 Evos. Five more Mercedes-AMGs then featured in the top 10, headed by the #87 Winward Racing entry in fifth.
Four cars shared the top spot on the mileage charts, each covering 40 laps. These were the #90 Ferrari 499P and Algarve Pro Racing’s trio of LMP2s.
Track action at Circuit Paul Ricard continues with Free Practice 2 at 13:30 CEST, before Qualifying for both of this weekend’s four-hour races begins at 16:05 CEST.
Image courtesy of Cetilar Racing
