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Qualifying report

Bahrain WEC: Porsche secures pole for final LMP1 race

Nick Tandy and Neel Jani claimed a final FIA World Endurance Championship pole position for Porsche before it bows out of LMP1 after this weekend's Bahrain round. 

LMP1 pole sitters Neel Jani, Andre Lotterer, Nick Tandy, Porsche Team

Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images

The drivers of the #1 Porsche 919 Hybrid beat the best of the Toyotas to the top of the timesheets by nearly three tenths of a second. 

Tandy had trailed Mike Conway in the #7 Toyota TS050 Hybrid by more than a second in the first runs after making a mistake on his lap. 

Jani then posted the fastest time of the session with a 1m39.084s, which prompted Porsche to send Tandy back out for a second run.

The Briton improved to a 1m39.683s, which gave the #1 Porsche an average of 1m39.383s.

Jose Maria Lopez was nearly seven tenths slower than Jani, which left the #7 Toyota in second with a 1m39.646s average.

Tandy said: "It was Neel's lap that made us think let's go for pole — when I saw 39.0, I thought wow. What a great result for a our last weekend."

Brendon Hartley and Timo Bernhard took third place with a 1m40.011s average, while Kazuki Nakajima and Anthony Davidson were fourth in the Toyota that has won the past two WEC rounds. 

Andre Negrao and Gustavo Menezes took LMP2 pole for the Signatech Alpine squad.  

Negrao was second fastest after the first runs aboard the French team's Oreca-Gibson 07 while Menezes lapped within three tenths of his team-mate's time. 

That consistency gave them a 1m47.227s average and pole by fourth tenths. 

Ho-Pin Tung struggled in the best of the Jackie Chan DC Racing Orecas on the first runs, but Thomas Laurent was able to leapfrog the car up to second after setting the quickest lap of the second batch of drivers. 

Their average of 1m47.612s put them just over a tenth up on the championship-leading Rebellion Oreca qualified by Bruno Senna and Julien Canal. 

Ferrari on pole for GTE decider

AF Corse Ferrari drivers Davide Rigon and Sam Bird claimed a fourth GTE Pro pole of the year. 

Rigon posted the fastest time in class witha 1m56.021s in the first runs and then Bird was only a couple of hundredths slower as they ended up on a 1m59.033s average aboard the #71 Ferrari 488 GTE.

That put them three tenths up on Aston Martin duo Darren Turner and Jonny Adam, who claimed second position with a 1m56.372s average. 

Ford's Andy Priaulx and Harry Tincknell were the highest-placed pairing with a realistic chance of taking the title in third place.

Their average in the #67 Ganassi Ford GT ended up on a 1m56.463s average, which put them four tenths up on points leaders James Calado and Alessandro Pier Guidi in the #51 Ferrari. 

Frederic Makowiecki and Richard Lietz, who lie second in the points, were only sixth fastest in their factory Porsche 911 RSR.

Pedro Lamy and Paul Dalla Lana took a seventh GTE Am class pole of the season in their Aston Martin Vantage GTE. 

Prototype results:

Pos.#DriversCarClassTimeGap
1 1 germany Andre Lotterer 
switzerland Neel Jani 
united_kingdom Nick Tandy 
Porsche 919 Hybrid LMP1 1'39.383  
2 7 japan Kamui Kobayashi 
united_kingdom Mike Conway 
argentina Jose Maria Lopez 
Toyota TS050 Hybrid LMP1 1'39.646 0.263
3 2 germany Timo Bernhard 
new_zealand Brendon Hartley 
new_zealand Earl Bamber 
Porsche 919 Hybrid LMP1 1'40.011 0.628
4 8 united_kingdom Anthony Davidson 
japan Kazuki Nakajima 
switzerland Sébastien Buemi 
Toyota TS050 Hybrid LMP1 1'40.774 1.391
5 36 france Nicolas Lapierre 
brazil Andre Negrao 
united_states Gustavo Menezes 
Alpine A470 LMP2 1'47.227 7.844
6 38 united_kingdom Oliver Jarvis 
china Ho-Pin Tung 
france Thomas Laurent 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'47.612 8.229
7 31 brazil Bruno Senna 
france Julien Canal 
france Nicolas Prost 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'47.721 8.338
8 26 france Loic Duval 
russia Roman Rusinov 
france Leo Roussel 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'47.989 8.606
9 25 russia Vitaly Petrov 
switzerland Simon Trummer 
mexico Roberto Gonzalez 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'48.176 8.793
10 24 france Jean-Eric Vergne 
united_kingdom Ben Hanley 
united_kingdom Matt Rao 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'48.374 8.991
11 28 france François Perrodo 
france Emmanuel Collard 
france Matthieu Vaxiviere 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'48.386 9.003
12 13 brazil Nelson Piquet Jr. 
denmark David Heinemeier Hansson 
switzerland Mathias Beche 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'48.387 9.004
13 37 china David Cheng 
france Tristan Gommendy 
united_kingdom Alex Brundle 
Oreca 07 LMP2 1'49.102 9.719

GTE results:

Pos.#DriversCarClassAvg TimeGap
1 71 united_kingdom Sam Bird 
italy Davide Rigon 
Ferrari 488 GTE LMGTE PRO 1'56.033  
2 97 united_kingdom Darren Turner 
united_kingdom Jonathan Adam 
Aston Martin Vantage LMGTE PRO 1'56.372 0.339
3 67 united_kingdom Harry Tincknell 
guernsey Andy Priaulx 
Ford GT LMGTE PRO 1'56.463 0.430
4 51 united_kingdom James Calado 
italy Alessandro Pier Guidi
Ferrari 488 GTE LMGTE PRO 1'56.881 0.848
5 95 denmark Marco Sorensen 
denmark Nicki Thiim 
Aston Martin Vantage LMGTE PRO 1'57.019 0.986
6 91 austria Richard Lietz 
france Frédéric Makowiecki 
Porsche 911 RSR LMGTE PRO 1'57.516 1.483
7 92 denmark Michael Christensen 
france Kevin Estre 
Porsche 911 RSR LMGTE PRO 1'57.522 1.489
8 66 germany Stefan Mücke 
france Olivier Pla 
Ford GT LMGTE PRO 1'57.588 1.555
9 98 portugal Pedro Lamy 
canada Paul Dalla Lana 
austria Mathias Lauda 
Aston Martin Vantage LMGTE AM 2'00.111 4.078
10 61 ireland Matt Griffin 
singapore Mok Weng Sun 
japan Keita Sawa 
Ferrari 488 GTE LMGTE AM 2'00.285 4.252
11 77 germany Christian Ried 
italy Matteo Cairoli 
germany Marvin Dienst 
Porsche 911 RSR (991) LMGTE AM 2'00.395 4.362
12 54 italy Francesco Castellacci 
spain Miguel Molina 
switzerland Thomas Flohr 
Ferrari 488 GTE LMGTE AM 2'01.352 5.319
13 86 united_kingdom Michael Wainwright 
united_kingdom Ben Barker 
united_kingdom Nick Foster 
Porsche 911 RSR (991) LMGTE AM    

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