By Tarek Ramchani
After a sensational pole position at Brands Hatch yesterday, the Audi squadwas aiming high in today's Qualifying Race. Unfortunately, the Audi Sport customer racing teams faced a very hard race.
The Audi teams were simply unlucky. Both Belgian Audi Club Team WRT and Phoenix Racing performed very well in the opening stages. Laurens Vanthoor strongly leading and Markus Winkelhock was in third.
After the mandatory pit-stops and several laps behind the Safety Car, the Audi R8 LMS ultra strugled with a single car within the Top 5. The #6 entry from Phoenix Racing finished fifth in the hands of Markus Winkelhock and Niki Mayr-Melnhof.
The #1 Audi from Belgian Audi Club Team WRT was sixth with Laurens Vanthoor and Cesar Ramos. The #4 Audi from Belgian Audi Club Team WRT was twelfth with Vincent Abril and Mateusz Lisowski. The #5 Audi from Phoenix Racing was thirteenth with Marc Basseng and Alessandro Latif. The #2 Audi from Belgian Audi Club Team WRT was fourteenth with René Rast and Enzo Ide. The #3 Audi from G-Drive Racing did not finish the race, the car shared by Stéphane Ortelli and Roman Rusinov retired in the first lap of the race.
Race win went to the #28 Lamborghini Gallardo FL2 from Grasser Racing Team. Second the #84 Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 from HTP Motorsport. Third the #0 BMW Z4 GT3 from BMW Team Brazil.
The Main Race will follow next with the starting order based on the final results of the Qualifying Race.
Photo credit: Blancpain GT Series
