Mies Grabs Pole for Qualifying Race at Portimao

Christopher Mies took pole in a dominant fashion for the Blancpain Sprint Series Qualifying Race at Portimao later today.

The German, sharing the No. 2 Belgian Audi Club Team WRT Audi R8 LMS ultra with Enzo Ide, was 0.376s clear of Vincent Abril in the Bentley Team HTP Continental GT3.

Track limits proved to be an issue at the Portuguese track, with Abril’s first Q3 flying lap being deleted amongst others.

Laurens Vanthoor was unable to match the speed of his WRT teammate today and had to settle for P3 on the grid (+0.415s), the No. 1 WRT Audi will line up right behind the No. 84 Bentley of their championship rivals in second.

Although many viewed the undulating Portimao track as the least favorable of the remaining BSS rounds for the Audis, the R8s were omnipresent in the Q3 shoot-out.

The Phoenix Audi of Markus Winkelhock delivered the fourth fastest time, followed by the No. 3 WRT R8 of Stephane Ortelli, while Always Evolving Motorsport got off to a good start in the series with a decent sixth-quickest time by Craig Dolby in the No. 173 Nissan GT-R Nismo GT3.

After showing promising pace earlier in the weekend, the Reiter Engineering Lamborghini Gallardo R-EX of Nick Catsburg only managed P8 in Qualifying.

Championship contenders BMW Team Brasil and their lead driver pairing Atila Abreu and Valdeno Brito have been struggling all weekend at their semi home track and will start from the back of the grid.

The Qualifying Race gets underway at 2:15 p.m. local time.

RESULTS: Qualifying