ROWE BMW on Monza Pole After Qualifying Cut Short

The No. 98 ROWE Racing BMW M4 GT3 took pole position for the Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Endurance Cup season-opener after qualifying was cut short due to power outages at Monza.

After an initial 45-minute delay due to power cuts at the Italian circuit, the first two 15-minute sessions of qualifying took place but the problem returned just before Q3.

Series organizer SRO Motorsports Group confirmed that qualifying would not resume after that, with the average times from the first two sessions determining the grid for this afternoon’s three-hour race.

The power cuts caused WiFi networks to temporarily disable, impacting the live broadcast, team garage facilities and other systems. It is understood that SRO has a backup system in place to ensure that the race can be run in the event of further disruption.

Philipp Eng and Marco Wittmann set a combined time of 1:46.274 in their BMW, which led a lockout of the top two rows on the grid for the German manufacturer.

Augusto Farfus and Maxime Martin qualified 0.016 seconds behind aboard the second-placed No. 46 Team WRT which also includes Valentino Rossi, who was due to take part in the canceled Q3.

The No. 32 WRT machine driven by Dries Vanthoor and Sheldon van der Linde took third, ahead of ROWE Racing’s Dan Harper and Neil Verhagen.

Henrique Chaves led the first qualifying session in the Bronze Cup-class No. 188 Garage 59 McLaren 720S GT3 ahead of Farfus, Harper and Eng, before dropping to seventh on average due to his Bronze-rated co-driver Miguel Ramos taking the reins in Q2.

The No. 25 Sainteloc Junior Team Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II was the best-qualifying non-BMW in fifth, ahead of the No. 63 Iron Lynx Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2.

The Audis and the Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evos tackled qualifying with 10 kg and 15 kg weight increases respectively, following a Balance of Performance update from SRO on Saturday evening.

Mercedes-AMG’s highest-qualifying entry from the available sessions was the GetSpeed-run Al Manar Racing example in ninth.

The BoP change also saw the BMWs, Lamborghinis and Porsche 911 GT3 Rs receive a 10 kg weight break, while the McLarens had 15 kg taken off and the Ferrari 296 GT3s were made 20 kg lighter.

SRO confirmed that the 3 Hours of Monza is provisionally scheduled to start at 3:15 p.m. local time (9:15: a.m. ET) which is 15 minutes later than originally planned.

RESULTS: Qualifying (final)