Vanthoor Puts WRT on Pole for 24H Spa

Photo: Olivier Beroud Images

Dries Vanthoor has scored pole position for the Total 24 Hours of Spa for Audi Sport Team WRT with a flying lap that put him six-tenths clear in Super Pole on Friday evening.

The Belgian driver posted a best lap of 2:18.578 in his second lap to put the No. 1 Audi R8 LMS GT3 to the top of the timesheets.

He shares the car with Alex Riberas and Christopher Mies and leads the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup standings after winning the season-opener at Monza in April.

Maxime Martin made it two Belgian drivers in the top two positions by qualifying his R-Motorsport Aston Martin Vantage GT3 in second, ahead of Nico Mueller in the No. 2 WRT Audi.

Davide Rigon and Kelvin van der Linde rounded out the top five for SMP Racing and Montaplast by Land Motorsport, respectively.

Nineteen of the 20 cars allowed to take part in Super Pole set lap times after Raffaele Marciello crashed out in warmup, sustaining too much damage to his Mercedes-AMG Team AKKA ASP car to take part in the session.

The car should start from 20th if it makes the grid tomorrow afternoon.

Fred Makowiecki set the ninth best time in his Manthey Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R but faces a ten-place grid penalty after Romain Dumas accrued four behavior warning points.

Seven manufacturers are set to be represented in the top ten on the grid.

The race will take the green flag at 4:30 p.m. local time on Saturday.

RESULTS: Super Pole

Jake Kilshaw

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