Estre, McLaren on Pole for Nürburgring 24

Photo: John Dagys

Dorr Motorsport will start the Nürburgring 24 from pole following a blazing lap in Friday’s Top-30 Qualifying shootout by Kevin Estre.

The McLaren factory driver shattered the event qualifying lap record, reeling off a 8:10.921 lap time in the mid-engined sports car he’ll share with Peter Kox, Tim Mullen and Alvaro Parente this weekend.

Estre, who set his flyer in the first of two allowed laps during the session, outpaced the No. 25 BMW Sports Trophy Team Marc VDS BMW Z4 GT3 of Maxime Martin by 2.576 seconds around the famed 15-mile Nordschleife circuit.

It marked the Frenchman’s first pole for the twice-around-the-clock endurance classic and also the first for the McLaren MP4-12c.

Martin’s 8:13.497 lap came in the BMW factory driver’s second flying lap, displacing the No. 4 Phoenix Racing Audi R8 LMS ultra of Christian Mamerow from the front row.

Lining up fourth will be the No. 14 Black Falcon Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 of Adam Christodoulou, who also improved on his final lap, followed by the Dirk Werner-qualified No. 19 BMW Sports Trophy Team Schubert entry, which completed the top-five overall and in the SP9 class for GT3 machinery.

Six different manufacturers were represented in the top-10, with late improvements by both the No. 7 Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT3 of Stefan Muecke and the 80 Nissan GT Academy Team RJN Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3 of Alex Buncombe, which qualified 9th and 10th, respectively.

The shootout ran without incident, other than the No. 24 Schulze Motorsport Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3 slowing on track. It came after a valiant effort to rebuild the car following an accident in Thursday’s opening qualifying session.

While the Top-30 Qualifying set the grid for the majority of the GT3 machinery, the remainder of the field was established from qualifying sessions on Thursday and Friday morning.

Class pole-sitters include the No. 48 Gazoo Racing Lexus LFA (SP8), No. 71 Kremer Racing Porsche 997 GT3 KR (SP7), No. 108 Rotek Racing Audi TT RS (SP4T) and the No. 111 Raeder Motorsport Audi TT RS 2.0 (SP3T).

The ADAC Zurich 24h Race gets underway Saturday at 4 p.m. local (10 a.m. ET).

RESULTS: Top-30 Qualifying

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