Magnus Paces Wet-Dry Nürburgring Practice

Sainteloc Racing’s Gilles Magnus set the fastest time in Free Practice for the Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Endurance Cup round at the Nürburgring, taking advantage of a drying track to surpass Jordan Pepper with late-session flyer.

The Belgian steered the No. 25 Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II to a best lap of 1:56.043, beating Pepper’s No. 163 GRT Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 by 0.225 seconds.

Pepper’s time, set in the first half of Saturday morning’s two-hour session, served as the benchmark for a significant period of time as the arrival of rain made further improvements impossible.

However, a late flurry of improvements followed in the final ten minutes as the track dried out, with Magnus setting his quickest time with seven minutes remaining.

Lucas Auer also improved in the closing stages to go up to third in the No. 48 Mercedes-AMG Team Mann-Filter Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, while Ugo de Wilde and Tom Gamble lept up to fourth and fifth for Sainteloc and Garage 59, respectively.

De Wilde led the Bronze Cup class, while teammate Magnus was fastest in Gold in addition to topping the overall timesheets.

Both ROWE Racing BMW M4 GT3s also broke into the top ten courtesy of Dan Harper and Philipp Eng.

The No. 84 Eastalent Racing Audi, which had sat in the top five in the opening hour, filtered down to eight with a 1:57.079 set by Albert Costa.

The No. 911 Pure Rxcing Porsche 911 GT3 R and No. 99 Tresor Attempto Racing Audi completed the overall top ten.

Silver Cup, meanwhile, was led by the No. 57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG in 26th overall.

Track action at the Nürburgring continues with Pre-Qualifying at 1:15 p.m. CEST (7:15 a.m. EDT).

RESULTS: Free Practice