WEC - The 488 GTE qualify in third and fifth place in Mexico

Mexico City, 2 September 2016 – The Ferraris 488 GTE number 51 (Bruni-Calado) and 71 (Rigon-Bird) of the AF Corse team will start from third and fifth position respectively in the 6 Hours of Mexico which will start at the Autodromo Hermanos Rodriguez at 1:30 p.m. local time (8:30 p.m. CET). The qualifications were more difficult for the 458 Italia number 83 of Collard-Perrodo-Aguas, which did no better than 6th place in the GTE-Am class.   GTE-Pro. In GTE-Pro class, Gianmaria “Gimmi” Bruni and Sam Bird took the first stint on cars 51 and 71 respectively. Bruni was able to record his best time immediately on a track with an uneven grip; he stopped the clock at 1’41”135. On the other hand, Bird clocked 1’41”647 and then improved to 1’41”298 on the following attempt. At this point, James Calado and Davide Rigon took control of the two cars. Imitating Bruni, Calado recorded his best time, an excellent 1’40”934, at the first try, thus bringing the aggregate time to 1’41”034. On the other hand, Davide Rigon stopped the clock at 1’41”554 on his first attempt and was unable to improve on it, also because of the traffic on the track. The final aggregate time for car number 71 was 1’41”426. The pole position went to the #95 Aston Martin of Nicki Thiim and Marco Sorensen (1’40”458) who finished ahead of the sister car #97 driven by Richie Stanaway and Darren Turner (1’40”600). The Porsche of Richard Lietz and Michael Christensen (1’41”383) squeezed between the two Ferraris. The Aston Martins have a definite edge in terms of peak speed, but it is a long race and the forecast does not exclude rain.   GET-Am. In GTE-Am class, the 458 Italia of the AF Corse team driven by Emmanuel Collard and François Perrodo (the only Ferrari in the field) had a decidedly complicated qualifying session. Emmanuel Collard took first turn on the track with car number 83; he clocked 1’43”253 before passing the wheel to François Perrodo. The French driver recorded a time of 1’44”508 to bring the overall time to 1’43”880. Two tenths of a second faster would have earned fourth place; as it is, the car, which will also be driven by Rui Aguas in the race, will start only in sixth place. Pole position went to Aston Martin #98 of Paul Dalla Lana, Mathias Lauda and Pedro Lamy.