Simon Gachet swims to pole position in Valencia
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After perfect Spanish late summer weather in Valencia yesterday, the weather gods struck again with rain on Sunday. For this reason, qualifying was again conducted with one session and not split into two segments as planned. During the session, the track dried out more and more and became faster accordingly.
Consequently, Sainteloc Racing driver Simon Gachet secured the fastest time on the last lap. In the Audi, which he shares with his compatriot Paul Evrard, the Frenchman lapped the circuit in 1:42.355 minutes.
Second place went to local hero Albert Costa. The Spaniard was 0.230 seconds off the best time in the Emil Frey Racing Ferrari 296 GT3. Costa shares the car with DTM driver Thierry Vermeulen.
Maxime Martin completed the top three positions in the WRT BMW M4 GT3, which he shares with nine-time motorbike world champion Valentino Rossi. So the nine-time motorbike world champion has another chance for a top result in the GT World Challenge Europe Sprint Cup!
After about eight minutes the session had to be interrupted. Nicola Marinangeli spun in the AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 into the gravel and had to be recovered.
Result (Top 10):
1st Paul Evrard/Simon Gachet - Sainteloc Racing - Audi R8 LMS GT3
2nd Thierry Vermeulen/Albert Costa - Emil Frey Racing - Ferrari 296 GT3
3rd Valentino Rossi/Maxime Martin - WRT - BMW M4 GT3
4th Alex Arkin Aka/Lorenzo Patrese - Tresor Attempto Racing - Audi R8 LMS GT3
5th Baptiste Moulin/Marcus Paverud - VSR - Lamborghini Hurácan GT3
6th Yuki Nemoto/Maximilian Paul - VSR - Lamborghini Hurácan GT3
7th Jordan Love/Alain Valente - Haupt Racing Team - Mercedes-AMG GT3
8th Alberto di Folco/Aurélien Panis - Boutsen VDS - Audi R8 LMS GT3
9th Erwan Bastard/Patric Niederhauser - Sainteloc Racing - Audi R8 LMS GT3
10 - Ricardo Feller/Mattia Drudi - Tresor Orange 1 - Audi R8 LMS GT3