+ Result: Qualifying, Indianapolis
The combined efforts of Lin Hodenius, Maxime Martin and Jules Gounon were enough to put Mercedes-AMG Team Lone Star Racing on top in Qualifying for the Indianapolis 8 Hour, securing the tag as favourite for the Pole Shootout in the process.
With a trio of 15-minute sessions and the grid decided by the average lap time across the three drivers, the pressure as on from the moment the lights went green for Q1, with only the fastest 10 cars overall heading into the Pole Shootout this evening.
After a quiet Pre-Qualifying session, it initially looked like advantage BMW as Raffaele Marciello produced a fine lap to put the #77 Team WRT M4 out front in Q1, with Hodenius just 0.050s behind. But from then on it was all about Martin, as a stellar Q2 performance paved the way for Lone Star to pull clear.
The Belgian dominated the second session, producing the fastest lap of the event so far – a 1:22.415s – to go half a second clear of anybody and establish the #80 Mercedes-AMG out front on average times. Gounon simply had to nurse that gap in Q3, and did so to great effect, dropping just 0.1s to finish fifth in the session but leave the #80 0.2s clear in the combined order.
Tom Kalendar, Maro Engel and Luca Stolz made it a Mercedes-AMG one-two aboard the #888 Team GMR car, ahead of Marciello, Augusto Farfus and Al Faisal Al Zubair’s Team WRT BMW in third. JMF Motorsports’ Mercedes-AMG shared by Michai Stephens, Mikael Grenier and Lucas Auer was fourth. Kelvin van der Linde, Charles Weerts and Valentino Rossi keep the championship pressure alive into the Shootout by finishing sixth in the sister WRT BMW.
Cars progressing to the Pole Shootout
- #80 Mercedes-AMG Team Lone Star Racing (Hodenius/Martin/Gounon) PRO
- #888 Mercedes-AMG Team GMR (Kalendar/Stolz/Engel) PRO
- #77 Team WRT BMW (Marciello/Farfus/Al Zubair) PRO
- #34 JMF Motorsports Mercedes-AMG (Stephens/Grenier/Auer) PRO
- #46 Team WRT BMW (Van der Linde/Weerts/Rossi) PRO
- #99 Random Vandals Racing BMW (Daly/Koch/De Phillippi) PRO
- #75 75 Express Mercedes-AMG (Mostert/Habul/Power) PRO
- #120 Wright Motorsports Porsche (Adelson/Skeer/Heinrich) PRO
- #51 Random Vandals Racing BMW (Choksey/Auberlen/Eng) PRO
- #29 Turner Motorsport BMW (Rothberg/Gallagher/Foley) PRO-AM