Dragonspeed Head First Grid of 2017 at Silverstone

When the session resumed Hanley in the Dragonspeed Oreca went quickest and then improved again just before the chequered flag was shown to end the final qualifying period at Silverstone.  Hanley’s time of 1m44.040 was 0.274 ahead of the no32 United Autosports Ligier-Gibson of Filipe Albuquerque and 1.1 seconds in front of the third placed car, the no39 Graff Oreca 07 of Enzo Guibbert. 

Ben Hanley: “It’s great to be on pole. It was a bit difficult at the beginning with the red flag, we were just warming the tyre at the right pressure and ready to go when we were flagged. But when we went out again we had two laps to push and hope for the best. We were planning to do one lap and save the tyres, but that didn’t happen. We now look straight to the race, it’s great to start from pole, we can’t complain about that! We just now have to concentrate on the race."

LMP3 saw AT Racing take pole position on the team’s P3 debut.  Denmark’s Mikkel Jensen took the top spot at the chequered flag posting a 1m53.665 lap to push the no2 United Autosports’ Ligier of Sean Rayhall into second place by 0.121 seconds. 

Row 2 of the LMP3 grid will be headed by Rayhall’s teammates in the no3 United Autosports Ligier JS P3 with Wayne Boyd finishing the 10 minute session 0.5 seconds behind the pole sitter.  He will be joined on row 2 by the n 16 Panis Barthez Competition car after Simon Gachet posted a 1m54.919 lap.

It was an Aston Martin 1-2 in the LMGTE class with Nicki Thiim taking the pole position for tomorrow’s opening race of the season in the no90 TF Sport Aston Martin Vantage.  The Dane set a time of 1m58.269, 0.197s ahead of Ross Gunn in the no99 Beechdean AMR Vantage. 

Row 2 of the LMGTE grid will be headed by the no55 Ferrari F488 of Matt Griffin, the Irish driver posting a tim 1.5 seconds behind the pole sitter and 0.6 seconds ahead of the 4^th placed car, the no77 Proton Competition Porsche 911 of Matteo Cairoli.

The 4 Hours of Silverstone will get underway at 14h30 on Saturday 15 April and you can watch the live streaming on the official ELMS website.

CLICK HERE for the result from Qualifying