Lopez Takes First ELMS Pole at Paul Ricard

Jose Maria Lopez beat Paul-Loup Chatin and Job van Uitert to secure pole position for the European Le Mans Series round at Paul Ricard.

Lopez piloted the No. 47 Cool Racing Oreca 07 Gibson to a best lap of 1:44.253, outpacing Chatin by 0.266 seconds.

It marks the first ELMS pole position for the Toyota Gazoo Racing WEC star, while the No. 47 car led qualifying for the second round in a row.

IDEC Sport driver Chatin came up short after initially winning a direct battle with the No. 65 Panis Racing machine driven by Van Uitert.

The pair traded top times back and forth a handful of times before the Frenchman appeared to beat his rival with best effort of 1:44.519.

However, Lopez swooped in and jumped to pole position moments before Chatin’s improvement, leaving the No. 48 IDEC Sport machine to complete the front row.

Van Uitert qualified third, ahead of Inter Europol Competition’s Olli Caldwell.

Alex Lynn completed the top five in the No. 25 Algarve Pro Racing Oreca, with Rene Binder sixth for Duqueine Team.

The No. 22 United Autosports Oreca failed to set a time after it stopped on track with Oliver Jarvis at the wheel, triggering a red flag.

Salih Yoluc took a dominant second pole of the season in LMP2 Pro-Am.

The Turkish driver posted a best lap of 1:46.718 aboard the No. 34 Racing Team Turkey Oreca.

This put him 0.830 seconds faster than Proton Competition’s No. 99 Oreca in the hands of Giorgio Roda.

The top three was completed by the No. 24 Nielsen Racing entry of Rodrigo Sales.

Tunjo, Ried on LMP3, GTE Poles

In LMP3, a three-way battle for pole position ended with WTM by Rinaldi Racing coming out on top.

Oscar Tunjo took a last-gasp pole position by reeling off a 1:51.267 aboard the No. 12 Duqueine D08 Nissan on his final flying lap.

The Colombian driver bested Eurointernational’s Glenn van Berlo and Nielsen Racing driver Ryan Harper-Ellam.

All three drivers topped the LMP3 session at various stages, but Tunjo’s best effort outpaced Van Berlo by just 0.059 seconds.

Harper-Ellam qualified third, a further 0.023 seconds behind in the No. 7 Ligier JS P320 Nissan.

Kai Askey slotted into fourth aboard the No. 13 Inter Europol Competition Ligier, while Miguel Espirito Santo completed the top five for Team Virage.

Christian Ried took Porsche’s first GTE pole of the season by beating Spirit of Race’s Duncan Cameron.

The German steered the No. 77 Proton Competition Porsche 911 RSR-19 to a best lap of 1:56.260, 0.147 seconds quicker than Cameron’s No. 55 Ferrari 488 GTE Evo.

Michael Fassbender put the No. 93 Porsche third on the grid, ahead of Formula Racing’s Johnny Laursen and the No. 72 TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage AMR in the hands of Arnold Robin.

The 4 Hours of Barcelona kicks off Sunday at 11:30 a.m. CEST (5:30 a.m. EDT).

RESULTS: Qualifying