The Spa-Francorchamps circuit hosted qualifying for round three of the FIA World Endurance Championship, in which the Ferrari 499Ps took second and third place. The times posted by Miguel Molina at the wheel of the number 50 Hypercar and Antonio Giovinazzi in the number 51 mean the Prancing Horse cars will set off from a favourable position in the 6 Hours of Spa on Saturday, 29 April at 12.45 p.m. (local time).
The session ran on a dry track in the afternoon, with an air temperature of 16°C and asphalt at just under 22°C. A red flag interrupted the middle part of the fifteen-minute timed session, obliging the crews to optimise their attempts to set the best time. On lap four, Molina stopped the clock at 2’00”836, setting the benchmark that sealed a place on the front row for the 499P shared with Antonio Fuoco and Nicklas Nielsen.
Giovinazzi’s performance improved in the last part of the session when he lapped the 7.004-kilometre Belgian track in 2’00”777. The time, which would have been worth pole position for the number 51 Ferrari, was cancelled because of a Track Limit infringement at Turn 7. The crew, comprising the driver from Puglia, Alessandro Pier Guidi and James Calado, will thus start from third due to their best time (2’00”973), 161 thousandths of a second behind the number 7 Toyota that will set off from pole.
Miguel Molina, 499P #50: “I think today we could have managed to be in pole position, but I got traffic in the last two sectors, but sometimes it happens. In any case, I was really happy with the car and my performance in the qualifying session. The team did an amazing job again. I keep repeating that we are learning a lot, but so far, we are doing a very good job. I’m really happy about the performance, but we keep in mind that the points and race are tomorrow. We are working to get closer to the Toyota, and tomorrow we will have the answer. Here you never know what can happen with the weather in Spa, so even if we expect a dry race, you never know. With my teammates, we will push to get a great result“.
Antonio Giovinazzi, 499P #51: “It has been a rollercoaster qualifying, like the track at Spa. I think I did a very good lap in my last attempt, but unfortunately, I was on gravel, and I lost laptime there. I didn’t gain anything, and I lost my pole position. In the end, in any case, we are P2 and P3. That is very good for Ferrari. Let’s go and have a good race tomorrow. If we’d had a clean session, it would have been better, but we put the car on pole. The laptime was there, but these are the rules, we have to accept it. Tomorrow it will be a long race. At Spa, you never know what the weather will be. Let’s hope for a clean race. I’m sure we can get a good result.”
Antonello Coletta, Head of Attività Sportive GT: “We are delighted with the performance of our cars today, despite just missing out on pole because of the cancellation of Giovinazzi’s time. Those are the rules, and you have to accept them. We showed we are competitive with both 499Ps, confirming an excellent start to the season for a very young project such as ours. The race will be long, the outcome difficult to predict partly because of the uncertain weather, but we will try to do everything to leave with another strong result.”
Ferdinando Cannizzo, Head of Endurance Race Cars: “The qualifying result makes us very happy, although it’s a little difficult to hide our disappointment about the time cancelled for the 51 and the lap that the 50 had to abort due to traffic. However, this result cannot distract us from tomorrow’s race, which we know we must prepare for very carefully if we want to consolidate our position in the standings”.
Source. Ferrari
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