Toyota continued to dominate the FIA World Endurance Championship as the #7 crew took pole in the 6 Hours of Silverstone ahead of the #8 car on Saturday.
Mike Conway started the proceedings in the #7 Toyota and took provisional pole with a 1m36.769s from Fernando Alonso in the #8 car with a 1m36.789s. Jose Maria Lopez then took over the #7 car to clock a 1m37.021s lap.
At the same time Kazuki Nakajima did a 1m37.824s meaning the #7 crew’s average time was 1m36.895s to #8’s 1m37.306s, enough to give pole to the team of Conway, Lopez and Kamui Kobayashi from Alonso, Nakajima and Sebastien Buemi.
The Toyotas did not take the track even after the red flag was cleared to recover the stricken #29 Racing Team Nederland of Frits van Eerd at Copse. Meanwhile, the first of the non-hybrid cars in the LMP1 category was the #11 SMP Racing.
Local hero Jenson Button’s (with Mikhail Aleshin and Vitaly Pterov) 1m38.305s lap helped the Russian outfit take third with a combined time of 1m38.932s as it beat the #3 Rebellion Racing (1m39.307s) of Gustavo Menezes, Mathias Beche and Thomas Laurent.
With Bruno Senna forced out of the weekend, the repaired #1 Rebellion Racing car of Andre Lotterer and Neel Jani did a good job to finish fifth with a combined time of 1m39.613s, beating the #10 Dragon Speed.
The Ben Hanley, Henrik Hedman and Renger van der Zande drive car clocked a 1m41.412s time to finish ahead of #17 SMP Racing (1m41.840s) of Stephane Sarrazin, Egor Orudzhev and Matevos Isaakyan.
The #4 ByKolles of Oliver Webb and Rene Binder rounded out the LMP1 class as the #37 Jackie Chan DC Oreca of Jazeman Jaafar, Weiron Tan and Nabil Jeffri took LMP2 class pole with a combined time of 1m44.896s.
It ended up as a Jackie Chan DC Oreca 1-2 as the #38 crew of Ho-Pin Tung, Gabriel Aubry and Stephane Richelmi finished second with a time of 1m45.083s. The #36 Signatech Alpine (1m46.370s) of Nicolas Lapierre, Pierre Thiriet and Andre Negrao were third.
Here's the overall classification after the #6hSilverstone LMP Qualifying.
LMP1 & Overall Pole Position: #7 @Toyota_Hybrid
LMP2 Pole Position: #37 @DCRacing_Team @JotaSport #WEC pic.twitter.com/biVuJJoQ9g— WEC (@FIAWEC) August 18, 2018
GTE-Pro and Am
The LMGTE-Pro class pole fight was intense with #66 Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK of Stefan Mucke and Olivier Pla took the top spot with a 1m55.727s combined time to beat #97 Aston Martin Racing of Alex Lynn and Maxime Martin by 0.078s.
Their combined time was 1m55.805s. Third in the class was #95 Aston Martin of Marco Sorensen and Nicki Thiim with a combined time of 1m56.103s as the #67 Ford (1m56.204s) of Harry Tincknell and Andy Priaulx ended up fourth.
In the LMGTE-Am class, it was #56 Team Project 1 Porsche of Egidio Perfetti. Jorg Bergmeister and Patrick Lindsey on pole from #77 Dempsey-Proton Racing Porsche of Matt Campbell, Christian Reid and Julien Andlauer.
Here's the overall classification after the #6hSilverstone LMGTE Qualifying.
LMGTE-Prol Pole: #66 @FordPerformance
LMGTE-Am Pole: #56 @Project1_93 @PorscheRaces #WEC pic.twitter.com/JjdCSwisRV— WEC (@FIAWEC) August 18, 2018