> Result: Pre-Qualifying
Yu Kuai maintained FAW/Phantom’s strong start at the Beijing Street Circuit by pipping Joel Sturm to fastest time in Pre-Qualifying.
The same drivers ended Friday’s testing and Free Practice sessions with the first and second quickest laps and remained on top, albeit with the order reversed, ahead of qualifying.
Both set their times in quick succession as the chequered flag flew. Sturm’s Absolute Porsche crossed the line first before Yu recorded a 1m44.656s moments later to establish a 0.013s advantage.
That was a fraction slower than Sturm’s Friday benchmark but again underlined the Audi and Chinese driver’s pace on home soil.
The flurry of improvements came after Song Jiajun backed Harmony’s Ferrari into the wall. Ayhancan Güven was on top at that point but ultimately wound up third following the session’s resumption with five minutes left on the clock.
Phantom’s Porsche finished 0.241s behind team-mate Yu and 0.028s clear of the other R8 driven by Jaxon Evans, while Origine’s Loek Hartog and the 5ZIGEN Nissan driven by Atsushi Miyake completed the top six.
Absolute’s #911 crew spent all night building up a new chassis for Huang Ruohan and Alessandro Ghirtetti who rewarded their mechanics’ hard work by setting seventh fastest time.
GTO with KRC’s BMW set the Silver-Am pace in 10th overall and AMAC’s Porsche topped the Am times.
Qualifying takes place at 11:50 CEST ahead of the weekend’s first hour-long race at 16:30.