FIA WEC Imola – Promising Sunday: Ferrari 1-2-3 on home soil after the Hyperpole 6 Hours of Imola!

Today Hyperpole was held or qualified for the second round of FIA WEC – of 6 hours of Imola – at the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo and Dino Ferrari exhibition in the Emilia-Romagna region of northern Italy. It became a celebration for Italy because Ferrari achieved the fastest times, resulting in a 1-2-3 for the AF Corse-Ferrari team on Saturday. As on Friday, Antonio Fuoco was once again the fastest of the Hypercars with his Ferrari 499P. In LMGT3, Manthey PurRxcing Porsche will start from pole position. It was an exciting day for the Italians, and it showed Ferrari it still hasn’t lost the luster of its Le Mans victory last year and can still beat the ever-fast Toyota and successful Porsche this year. Regardless of how the race goes on Sunday, one thing is certain: it will be very exciting! Ferrari is confident of winning in front of its home crowd, Porsche will be doing everything it can to confirm its current best form and Toyota will be looking to regain its leading position of recent years. And also do not discount BMW and Peugeot, they can give unexpected surprises. Below you’ll find the highlights from Saturday’s Hyperpole during the FIA ​​WEC 6 Hours of Imola Weekend.

Hypercars

Great glory for the #50 Ferrari AF Corse as the entire Tifosi crowd celebrated Antonio Fuoco’s epic time of 1.29.466 seconds to take the third WEC pole for himself and Ferrari.

Fuoco set a pole time in the final minutes, finishing ahead of the No. 83 AF Corse-Ferrari 499P of Robert Shwartzman by 0.419 seconds.

The #51 AF Corse 499P, driven by Alessandro Pier Guidi, made it 1-2-3 for the brand with the yellow logo and the galloping horse with a best time of 1m29.953s.

The #6 Porsche Penske 963 of Kevin Estre was the best of the non-Ferraris in fourth, finishing ahead of the #5 Penske Porsche of Matt Campbell, which had to bounce back from an unfortunate trip into the Tamburello gravel trap.

Kamui Kobayashi in the #7 Toyota GR010 Hypercar completed the top six, Brendon Hartley in the sister car spinning Tosa to end the Hyperpole session in P8.

Others in the top ten include:

7e Nr20 BMW M-team (René Rast)

8e Racing Nr8 Toyota Gazoo (Brendon Hartley)

Team 9e Nr12 Hertz Jota (Callum IIott)

10e Proton Competition Porsche number 99 (Julien Andlauer)

Rain threatened the qualifying sessions, but despite this everyone managed to qualify well, with the only notable event in the first session before Hyperpole being a spin by Dries Vanthoor in the number 15 BMW at Piratella.

LMGT3

Qatari winning Manthey PureRxcing Porsche 911 RSR LMGT3 driven by Aliaksandr Malykhin continued his exceptional start to the season with a strong position in LMGT3.

Malykhin topped out with a time of 1:42.365 seconds and took a convincing step into the Hyperpole session, 0.692 seconds ahead of the chasing field. Malykhin will start on the front row, alongside the Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage LMG3, driven by Ian James during qualifying. The British-born American clocked 1m43.058s.

Third in LMGT3 is the number 46 Team WRT BMW M4, driven by Ahmed Al Harthy. The Omani driver won the No. 31 BMW M4 LMGT3, with Darren Leung on board.

Sarah Bovy in the Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracán LMGT3 took fifth, ahead of the #88 Proton Ford Mustang Competition driven by local star Giorgio Roda.

Others in the top ten include:

7e Manthey EMA Porsche (Yasser Shahin)

Eight Nr55 VISTA AF Corse Ferrari (Francois Heriau)

9th Nr54 VISTA AF Corse Ferrari (Thomas Flohr)

No. 10 59 United Autosports McLaren (James Cottingham)

Of WEC 6 Hours of Imola begins Sunday, April 21 at 1:00 PM local time.

Photo: FIA WEC

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