Brabham grabs Lime Rock pole

For most of the disjointed prototype session - which was interrupted by two red flags for debris and damaged kerbing - only a few tenths of a second had covered the top seven cars as the LMP1 and LMP2 cars repeatedly swapped provisional pole.

Pagenaud emerged at the head of the pack in the de Ferran Acura in the final minute and looked set for pole, only for Brabham to first beat the Frenchman by 0.020 seconds, and then make an enormous gain on his last lap to move 0.386 seconds clear of the field.

"To be three tenths up is great, because I thought it would be something like three thousandths," said Brabham. "We came here and hit the road running really quickly. We've been in the top two in every session. I thought we had a good shot at pole, I just had to dig a little deeper than I expected to get it."

Although the LMP2 cars had dominated practice, Audi showed better form in qualifying as Lucas Luhr fought for pole before ending up third on the overall grid, ahead of the two Penske Porsches, which had to sit out the first few minutes of the session as a punishment for driving infringements in practice.

Adrian Fernandez completed the top six in the Fernandez Acura, while debutant Franck Montagny was pushed back to seventh on the grid for Andretti Green despite topping morning practice and holding provisional pole briefly during qualifying.

As usual the two Chevrolets battled between themselves for GT1 pole. Jan Magnussen held the provisional class pole at first, but Oliver Gavin decided to make a second attempt and snatched the top spot away from his teammate.

Dirk Werner dominated GT2 qualifying and claimed the Farnbacher Loles team's first pole position in the series.

While just 0.251 seconds covered second to fifth in class, Werner held a commanding 0.566 second advantage over second-placed Mika Salo (Risi Ferrari), having set an early provisional pole by a comfortable margin and then moved even further clear on his second run after his rivals had threatened to close in.

Flying Lizard Porsche duo Wolf Henzler and Patrick Pilet were third and fifth in class, split by Dirk Muller's Tafel Ferrari. The second Tafel car did not participate in the session after Alex Figge crashed in practice. The former Champ Car driver was taken to hospital for further checks having reported pain in one of his feet.

Pos  Cl   Qualifying driver   Car                     Time
 1.  P2   David Brabham       Acura ARX-01b           46.696
 2.  P2   Simon Pagenaud      Acura ARX-01B           47.082  + 0.386 
 3.  P1   Lucas Luhr          Audi R10 TDI            47.104  + 0.408 
 4.  P2   Patrick Long        Porsche RS Spyder       47.177  + 0.481 
 5.  P2   Romain Dumas        Porsche RS Spyder       47.240  + 0.544 
 6.  P2   Adrian Fernandez    Acura ARX-01b           47.264  + 0.568 
 7.  P2   Franck Montagny     Acura ARX-01b           47.313  + 0.617 
 8.  P2   Marino Franchitti   Porsche RS Spyder       47.325  + 0.629 
 9.  P1   Emanuele Pirro      Audi R10 TDI            47.403  + 0.707 
10.  P2   Chris Dyson         Porsche RS Spyder       47.651  + 0.955 
11.  P2   Gerardo Bonilla     Mazda Lola B07-46       49.251  + 2.555 
12.  GT1  Oliver Gavin        Corvette C6.R           52.792  + 6.096 
13.  GT1  Jan Magnussen       Corvette C6.R           53.039  + 6.343 
14.  GT2  Dirk Werner         Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     54.154  + 7.458 
15.  GT2  Mika Salo           Ferrari 430 GT          54.720  + 8.024 
16.  GT2  Dirk Mueller        Ferrari 430 GT          54.824  + 8.128 
17.  GT2  Wolf Henzler        Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     54.932  + 8.236 
18.  GT2  Patrick Pilet       Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     54.971  + 8.275 
19.  GT2  Tom Milner          Panoz Esperante         55.312  + 8.616 
20.  GT2  Patrick Friesacher  Ferrari 430 GT          55.458  + 8.762 
21.  GT2  Darren Law          Porsche 911 GT3 RSR     55.466  + 8.770 
22.  GT2  Jonny Cocker        Aston Martin Vantage    57.409  + 10.713
23.  GT2  Anthony Lazzaro     Doran Ford GT-R         57.724  + 11.028
24.  GT2  Chris Hall          Dodge Viper Comp Coupe  58.508  + 11.812