Vaxiviere Quickest for Alpine in FP2 at Sebring

Photo: MPS Agency

Matthieu Vaxiviere set the pace in the second Free Practice session of the day for FIA World Endurance Championship competitors ahead of Friday’s season-opening 1000 Miles of Sebring.

The Frenchman laid down a 1:50.512 lap time in his grandfathered Alpine A480 Gibson on the final lap of the 60-minute session to edge out the LMP2 pace-setting No. 23 United Autosports Oreca 07 Gibson of Paul di Resta by 0.528 seconds.

Vaxviere’s time, which improved on teammate Andre Negrao’s 1:50.845, was nearly one-second slower than Romain Dumas’ pace-setting 1:49.738 lap time from the morning session in the No. 708 Glickenhaus 007 Pipo.

The U.S.-flagged team was classified 14th overall in FP2 thanks to Ryan Briscoe’s 1:52.479 lap time.

A collision between Mike Conway’s No. 7 Toyota GR010 Hybrid and the No. 28 JOTA Oreca 07 Gibson of Jonathan Aberdein in Turn 1 resulted in a yellow flag with less than 15 minutes in the session.

The incident was put under review by race control. 

It came after a Full Course Yellow was deployed for the No. 45 Algarve Pro Racing Oreca of Steven Thomas, who was reported to be going slowly on-track.

There were issues for the No. 8 Toyota as well, with Brendon Hartley’s 1:51.015 lap time that would have put him second quickest overall disallowed due to a pit speeding infraction. 

It shuffled the car down to fifth overall on the time sheets.

The No. 22 United Oreca of Filipe Albuquerque was second in LMP2 with a 1:51.058 lap time, meanwhile.

Albuquerque’s time in FP2 was 0.186 seconds faster than the No. 41 Team WRT Oreca of Ferdinand Habsburg, who set his time early.

GTE-Pro was led by the No. 92 Porsche 911 RSR-19 of Michael Christensen, thanks to a 1:58.488 lap time that edged out Nick Tandy’s No. 64 Chevrolet Corvette C8.R by 0.092 seconds.

The No. 91 Porsche was third on the class time charts, meanwhile.

A 2:00.029 flyer by David Pittard put the No. 98 NorthWest AMR Aston Martin Vantage GTE on top of GTE-Am.

The third and final Free Practice session gets underway Thursday at 11:55 a.m. ET.

RESULTS: Free Practice 2

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John