Aston Martin Racing to lead away tight GT battle at Le Mans

Aston Martin, Ferrari, Corvette, Ford and Porsche all played their part in a thrilling qualifying session which ended with just 1.7 seconds separating the 12 cars in the LMGTE Pro category. 

• Darren Turner, a former 2-time class winner at Le Mans, put the No.97 Aston Martin Vantage which he will share with Jonny Adam and Daniel Serra on pole in the GTE categories with a record-breaking time of 3:50.837. 
• Between Turner and his AMR team mates in the No.95 (Thiim-Sørensen-Stanaway) was the No.51 Ferrari 488 GTE of James Calado (PierGuidi-Rugolo), just 0.19s seconds from the pole man.
• Ferrari, Ford, Corvette and Porsche followed in quick succession behind them, the times signalling a great race ahead in this World Championship category.
• The different GT marques were equally well represented in LMGTE Am, with the first four places being filled by Corvette, Aston Martin, Ferrari and Porsche.
• The WEC’s Am points leading No.98 Aston Martin Vantage of Pedro Lamy-Paul Dalla Lana and Mathias Lauda challenged for the class pole throughout, finishing the third and final qualifying session 0.3s behind the Larbre Corvette.  Next highest WEC competitor was the No.77 Dempsey Proton Racing Porsche 911 RSR, the performance of Cairoli-Ried-Dienst no doubt being boosted by the presence of team owner Patrick Dempsey.
• There is no track action tomorrow to allow teams time to prepare the cars for the twice-round-the-clock classic which begins at 15h00 on Saturday. 

All times can be found HERE