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European Le Mans Series

Beche Puts TDS on Pole for 4H Silverstone

Beche continues to lead ELMS weekend with pole…

Photo: Vision Sport Agency

Photo: Vision Sport Agency

Mathias Beche continued to dominate the European Le Mans Series action at Silverstone, and took pole position for the Thiriet by TDS Racing Oreca 05 Nissan on a wet track.

Beche was the only driver to set a flying lap early on in the session, up to the red flag that was called with six minutes remaining to recover Damien Faulkner whose Murphy Prototypes Oreca 03R was stranded in the gravel at Luffield.

The session resumed, but Beche remained out front. Stefano Coletti qualified 1.105 seconds down on the TDS driver, and so his No. 32 SMP Racing BR Engineering BR01 Nissan will start this afternoon’s race from second on the grid.

Leo Roussel was third in the Pegasus Racing Morgan Nissan, ahead of Harry Tincknell and Nicolas Lapierre in the G-Drive Gibson 015S Nissan and DragonSpeed Oreca 05 Nissan, respectively.

A few drivers’ final laps were compromised after a yellow flag at Club Corner was brought out at the end of the session, when Parth Ghorpade spun the Algarve Pro Racing Ligier JS P2 Nissan.

Ross Kaiser grabbed the LMP3 pole from Dino Lunardi at the last moment, setting a 2:13.264 in his 360 Racing Ligier JS P3.

Just 0.051 seconds back, Lunardi held on to second for the No. 19 Duqueine Engineering crew, while Enzo Guibbert qualified third for Graff Racing. Alex Brundle and Matt Bell completed the top five in the pair of United Autosports Ligiers.

Several LMP3 drivers went off the circuit on the wet track, including Simon Gachet in the Panis-Barthez car, Pierre Nicolet at Oak Racing and Graff’s Sean Rayhall.

Richie Stanaway took the pole position for Aston Martin Racing in GTE, lapping at 2:19.348. For most of the session the Kiwi was over two seconds clear of second place.

Richard Lietz closed the deficit to 0.938 seconds on his final lap, promoting the No. 88 Proton Competition Porsche to second. Andrea Bertolini slotted into third for JMW Motorsport, having been edged out by Lietz.

Two more Ferraris followed, with Matt Griffin for AF Corse and Alessandro Pier Guidi for AT Racing in fourth and fifth.

The Four Hours of Silverstone will get underway at 2:30 p.m. local time.

RESULTS: Qualifying

Jake Kilshaw is a UK-based journalist. He is a graduate of Politics and International Relations.

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