Regularly the fastest on the No. 50, Antonio Fuoco once again set the pace. By completing his best lap in 1.29.466, he relegated his closest pursuer, Robert Shwartzman in the yellow Ferrari, to 419 thousandths. To the delight of fans already present in large numbers, Alessandro Pierguidi completes the trifecta of Prancing Horse at 487 thousandths.
Responsible for qualifying Laurens Vanthoor's Porsche 963, Kevin Estre is the first no “Ferrarist”fourth at 635 thousandths, three small tenths ahead of Matt Campbell's sister car.
Dries at fault for his birthday
Kamui Kobayashi lifts the first Toyota into 6th position at 944 thousandths, just ahead of the first BMW Hypercars entrusted to René Rast. The German conceded 1.134 on his best lap and precedes the second Toyota of Brendon Hartley and the private Porsches of Calum Illot and Julien Andlauer.
Second during free practice, Dries Vanthoor did not have a happy birthday, the BMW driver falling to 13th place (just behind the Cadillac) after causing a red flag in Q1 which prohibited him from finishing the session. The BMW driver preceded the Peugeot 9×8 of Stoffel Vandoorne in the time trial, 14th ahead of his teammate Jean-Eric Vergne, the Lamborghini C63 and the Alpine A424.
Porsche on pole in GT3, Martin 3rd, Bovy 5th
Qualifying in GT3 was no more closely contested, with pole going to the Porsche of Russian Aliaksandr Malykhin who should never have been classified Bronze and posted times worthy of the best Silver. He also races in the Gold Cup in GT World Challenge. On another planet, despite thirty kg of ballast, the Manthey Racing driver stuck to Ian James' Aston Martin Vantage by almost 7 tenths.
Ahmad Al Harthy in the first BMW M4 WRT was third at 0.734. The teammate of Maxime Martin and Valentino Rossi was ahead of Darren Leung's sister car by six thousandths.
Good fifth place for Sarah Bovy in the pink Lamborghini Huracan of the Iron Dames, less than a tenth from 2nd place. This shows that the gaps are really very tight, far behind the inaccessible Bronze in gold.
On pole in Qatar, Tom Van Rompuy this time could not do better than 11th at the wheel of a Corvette admittedly weighted with 30 kg.
