6H Spa: #7 takes first Hypercar pole, Estre tops GTE for Porsche

Kamui Kobayashi took overall pole position during qualifying for the opening FIA World Endurance Championship round at Spa-Francorchamps.

Qualifying ahead of the opening round, the 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps, was split into two sessions: one for the two GTE classes, and the other for LMP2 and Hypercar qualifying.

The GTE session started in dramatic fashion as #77 of Christian Reid lost the rear of his Porsche 911 RSR on his out-lap and crashed at the top of the Eau Rouge-Raidillon complex. He got out the car safely and conscious.

After a brief red flag period, with six-and-a-half minutes on the clock in the GTE session, the #56 of Egidio Perfetti had a heavy crash in the same place and of similar nature to Reid.

Both of these crashes, on their out-laps, could be put down to cold tyres and low tyre pressures.

Several cars had their first laps deleted, leaving a single-flying lap as their main attempt. The debuting D’Station Racing squad being one of them.

In GTE-Pro, Kevin Estre of the #92 stormed to the top with a potent GTE lap record of a 2m11.219s.

Ben Keating sought redemption after the crash earlier at the Prologue this week but secured class-pole in his first days in the #33 Aston Martin Vantage GTE.

LMP2 qualifying was an intense fight but the #22 of Filipe Albuquerque secured the fifth-consecutive class pole position in the FIA WEC LMP2; it is their 10th consecutive-pole in light of all their sportscar commitments carried over from last year.

The reigning LMP2 world champion set a time over two-tenths quicker than the #36 Alpine Elf Matmut Hypercar in the class above.

His main rival for pole was current Formula E championship leader Nyck De Vries in the #26 who closely rivaled the pace of the Portuguese driver.

Reigning world LMP drivers’ champion Kamui Kobayashi secured overall pole position and the first in Toyota’s new GR010 Hybrid. A time of 2m00.747s was pushed out ahead of his compatriot Kazuki Nakajima who did a 2m01.266s in the sister #8 car.

If you're going to spend a couple of minutes watching anything, why not make it @kamui_kobayashi's history-making #6HSpa pole lap. Enjoy! ☺️ #GoHyper #PushingTheLimitsForBetter @FIAWEC pic.twitter.com/hBcEScBR6Z

— TOYOTA GAZOO Racing WEC (@TGR_WEC) April 30, 2021