Grenier Quickest for 75 Express in Suzuka Night Practice

Photo: Gruppe C Photography/SRO

Mikael Grenier led the way in night practice for Sunday’s Suzuka 1000km, putting 75 Express atop the overall time sheets for the fourth leg of the Intercontinental GT Challenge.

Grenier reeled off a best lap of 2:00.395 in the No. 75 Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo early in the 90-minute session to outpace the No. 64 Miedecke Motorsport By Team MPC Ford Mustang GT3 EVO of Chris Mies by 0.182 seconds.

It marked the first dry running of the weekend after both paid test sessions earlier in the day were rain-soaked.

The No. 7 Absolute Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo, which led the way in both of those sessions, ended up third quickest in night practice, thanks to a 2:00.591 lap time by Dorian Boccolacci.

KRC’s Bronze Cup class BMW M4 GT4 EVO of Maxime Oosten was fourth quickest, ahead of the Pro-Am pace-setting No. 60 LM Corsa Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo of Giancarlo Fisichella, which completed the overall top-five.

AO by Absolute Racing’s Porsche, featuring the debut of the ‘Bushi Rex’ character, was sixth on the time charts in the hands of Julien Andlauer, followed by two other Pro entires in the form of the No. 45 PONOS Racing Ferrari and No. 500 TEAM 5ZIGEN Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3.

The No. 69 WRT BMW was second quickest in Bronze and ninth overall with Dan Harper, meanwhile.

The 90-minute session had two red flags, the first for the No. 72 Harmony Racing Ferrari of Liu Kaishun, who spun on his out lap and beached the Bronze class Ferrari in the gravel at Degner Curve.

A second red came out with 16 minutes to go for the No. 181 Norik Racing Ferrari of Taku Bamba, which had impact with the barriers at Degner 2.

Eight minutes was added to the clock after the second stoppage but saw no notable lap time improvements.

Pre-Qualifying is next up and will get underway Saturday at 10:40 a.m. local (Friday, 9:40 p.m. EST) with live coverage on SRO’s GT World YouTube channel.

RESULTS: Night Practice

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