FP1 Imola: AF Corse Ferrari Leads the Way; LMGT3 sees TF Sport fastest
Below are the main headlines from Free Practice 1 at the 6 Hours of Imola, round two of the FIA WEC.
Hypercar
AF Corse Ferrari heads the Hypercar field as the No.83 Ferrari 499P machine of Yifei Ye, Robert Kubica and Robert Shwartzman takes the early advantage at Imola
The predominantly yellow Ferrari sets a fastest lap of 1m31.347s in the hands of Yifei Ye, who outpaces the No.50 Ferrari AF Corse entry driven by Antonio Fuoco, Miguel Molina and Nicklas Nielsen.
Fuoco sets a best lap just 0.156s shy of Ye’s outright best as teams use second phase of the 90-minutes to focus on longer runs and general race set-ups
Peugeot TotalEnergies make positive start with updated Peugeot 9X8 Hypercar as Mikkel Jensen sets fastest lap of 1m31.964s in the No.93 car he shares with Jean-Eric Vergne and Nico Mueller.
Lamborghini also start strongly with a promising fourth place as Mirko Bortolotti hooks up a committed 1m32.015s lap as he gets set for his and the teams home race with all-new Lamborghini SC63 Hypercar
No.51 Ferrari AF Corse and No.99 Proton Competition Porsche 963 round out the top six places as Antonio Giovinazzi and Julien Andlauer claim best laps during the session
Porsche Penske sit seventh and eighth as the No.5 Porsche 963 (Matt Campbell) laps slightly quicker than the No.6 (Kevin Estre) sister car, while Toyota Gazoo Racing place ninth and tenth as No.7 (Nyck de Vries) heads the No.8 Toyota GR010 Hypercar (Sebastien Buemi)
One red flag is shown during the session for track clearance while a full course yellow is also briefly deployed for gravel on track
LMGT3
TF Sport place 1-2 in GT3 as the No.82 Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R leads sister No.81 car. Daniel Juncadella and Charlie Eastwood set times of 1m 1m42.113s and 1m42.719s respectively
Hometown heroes Vista AF Corse Ferrari take third position as Davide Rigon peaks with a 1m42.971s lap in one of the two Ferrari 296 GT3 cars in the 18 car GT3 field
Team WRT place fourth as Maxime Martin sets fastest lap for the No.46 BMW M4 he shares with Ahmed Al Harthy and local legend Valentino Rossi.
No.55 Vista AF Corse Ferrari of Simon Mann, Francois Heriau and Alessio Rovera sits fifth as Rovera claims best time of 1m43.088s
Rounding out the top six is the second of the Team WRT BMW M4’s with Augusto Farfus lapping just 0.025s off Rovera’s time
Fastest Porsche in the GT3 field is the Manthey EMA entered 911 RSR GT3 with young Dutch talent Morris Schuring setting the best lap for seventh in the final timing classifications
