ELMS 4 Hours of Silverstone - Free Practice 2

In the LMP2 category, the battle at the top was once again hard fought. This afternoon's best lap time (1:49.499) was set by the No.41 Greaves Motorsport Zytek Z11SN Nissan by Tom Kimber-Smith, who shares his car with Chris Dyson and the youngest driver of the series, Matt McMurry. The British driver headed the No.43 Morgan-Judd of NewBlood by Morand Racing driven by a rapid Christian Klien, his best lap being only four tenths of a second behind Kimber-Smith. For the Swiss team, the end of the session wasn't so happy as they had to sit on the side lines following an incident with a GTE car forced them off track. Third best lap in the LMP2 class was set by another Morgan, this time with a Nissan engine. The No.46 Thiriet by TDS Racing, in the hands of Frenchman Tristan Gommendy, finished the session only seven tenths of a second from the first-placed car. Fourth this afternoon was JOTA Sport with the second Zytek Z11SN (No.38), ending the session only one thousandth from the No.46 Thiriet car.  The battle tomorrow throughout the ELMS grid will be a tough one.

The Ferrari domination of the morning was being somewhat threatened this afternoon. The two fastest times were set by the Italian cars but the third place was taken by a Porsche. The No.55 AF Corse Ferrari 458 Italia driven by Cameron-Griffin-Rugolo set the best time of 1:58.842. Second was the No.72 Ferrari of Andrea Bertolini and only three tenths of a second separate the two Ferraris! The No.76 IMSA Performance Matmut Porsche of Armindo-Narac -Hallyday was the one which shuffled the pack of Italian cars, less than five tenths of a second from the best Ferrari car!

The action was also very tense in the GTC category. Ferrari topped the time sheets with one of the new teams in town: Team Ukraine's No.96 Ferrari Italia GT3. The blue and yellow F458 GT3 set the best lap time of 2:01.177, ahead of No.73 SMP Racing Ferrari which ended the session in second position, only three tenths of a second behind. Third this afternoon was French driver Maxime Soulet at the wheel of Prospeed Competition's No.75 Porsche GT3.

The day devoted to free practice sessions is now over.  The two qualifying sessions (20 minutes each long) now take centre stage. The first one will be devoted to the GTE and GTC cars (11.05am local time, 12.05pm CET) while in LMP2, the cars will fight for the pole position from 11.30 am local time (12.30pm CET)

Visit www.europeanlemansseries.com to see results and www.radiolemans.com live to benefit from informed commentary.

David Bristol/ Mapidu Media