Sarrazin gives Peugeot last-gasp pole

While Peugeot still enjoy a clear performance advantage over rivals Audi in the battle for supremacy in LMP1, the gap has closed a little bit since Monza.

But it was circumstances rather than speed that threatened Peugeot's hitherto dominant qualifying record in 2008.

Sarrazin, like his teammate Marc Gene in the sister car, was caught out by the second of two red flag incidents that occurred just before both Peugeot the Hdi FAPs were starting their qualifying runs.

It meant that the French cars were forced to abort and return to the pits, leaving them just five minutes to post representative qualifying times.

But crucially in Sarrazin's case, he hadn't begun his flying lap before the reds came out and thus had enough left in his qualifying tyres to depose the Audis when the session resumed.

"It was an easy car to drive with a very good balance," said Sarrazin. "So I just pushed hard, made a good lap with no mistakes. Now for the race!"

Gene couldn't match McNish's time, though - which was less than 0.7 seconds slower than Sarrazin's pole - and so for the first time in the 2008 Le Mans Series, one of the silver cars will start on the front row.

While all of the top three cars recorded 1:58 laps, Mike Rockenfeller in the second Audi, who twice narrowly avoided being taken out by crashing cars, was fourth fastest on 2:00.796.

Stefan Mucke was fifth fastest in the Lola Aston Martin, and was again the fastest petrol-engined qualifier, but the fact that he was more than 4s off the pole time illustrates just how much of an advantage the diesel cars have right now.

The two Pescarolo cars of Emmanuel Collard and Harald Primat were next up.

Eighth overall and fastest of the LMP2 qualifiers was once again the Van Merksteijn Racing Porsche RS Spyder, driven by former F1 driver and Spa crowd favourite Jos Verstappen.

The Dutchman's nearest rival this time was not one of the other Porsches, but instead the Speedy Team Lola Coupe driven by Andrea Belicchi.

Third in LMP2 was Michael Vergers in the Barazi Epsilon Zytek.

Horag Racing's Porsche was lucky not get involved in the first of the two red flag incidents, when the Quifel ASM Lola shunted at Turn 9. Olivier Pla was at the wheel of the LMP2 machine, but climbed from the car unscathed.

The session was then stopped again after five minutes when Jean de Pourtales' Kruse Schiller Motorsport Lola Mazda hit the wall heavily at the same place.

Antonio Garcia took pole position in GT1 with 2:16.074, after waiting late in the GT qualifying session to bang in a fast lap.

The Spaniard and the Modena Aston Martin team have been quickest all weekend at Spa and, in truth, their position at the top of the times was no surprise.

Second in class was Guillaume Moreau in the Luc Alphand Corvette, with Peter Kox an impressive third in the Lamborghini, just three tenths further back.

Gianmaria Bruni will start the race on Sunday as the fastest GT2 driver, having taken pole in the Virgo Motorsport Ferrari F430GT.

Mark Lieb was second quickest in the Team Felbermayr Porsche while Pierre Kaffer put the Farnbacher Ferrari third despite a trip through the gravel at Rivage.

Pos  Driver                       Car                   Time      Class
 1.  Lamy/Sarrazin/Wurz           Peugeot 908 Hdi-FAP   1:58.069  LMP1
 2.  Capello/McNish               Audi R10 TDI          1:58.705  LMP1
 3.  Gene/Minassian/Villeneuve    Peugeot 908 Hdi-FAP   1:58.787  LMP1
 4.  Premat/Rockenfeller          Audi R10 TDI          2:00.796  LMP1
 5.  Mucke/Charouz                Lola Aston Martin     2:02.510  LMP1
 6.  Collard/Boullion             Pescarolo Judd        2:04.709  LMP1
 7.  Primat/Tinseau               Pescarolo Judd        2:05.201  LMP1
 8.  Van Merksteijn/Verstappen    Porsche RS Spyder     2:05.841  LMP2
 9.  Belicchi/Pompidou/Zacchia    Lola Judd             2:05.880  LMP2
10.  Barbosa/Ickx/Forsten         Pescarolo Judd        2:05.918  LMP1
11.  Hall/Kerr                    Creation - Aim        2:06.062  LMP1
12.  Barazi/Vergers/Rees          Zytek 07S             2:06.349  LMP2
13.  Lienhard/Theys/Lammers       Porsche RS Spyder     2:06.955  LMP2
14.  Burgueno/de Castro           Epsilon Euskadi Judd  2:07.051  LMP1
15.  Erdos/Newton                 Lola MG               2:07.539  LMP2
16.  Kimber-Smith/Foster          WF01 Zytek            2:08.047  LMP2
17.  Amaral/Pla                   Lola AER              2:08.224  LMP2
18.  Elgaard/Nielsen              Porsche RS Spyder     2:08.322  LMP2
19.  Ragues/Lahaye                Pescarolo Judd        2:08.676  LMP2
20.  Hughes/Kane                  WF01 Zytek            2:08.873  LMP2
21.  Ojjeh/Gosselin/Schroyen      Zytek 07S             2:11.269  LMP2
22.  Lavaggi/Kaufmann             Lavaggi AER           2:11.455  LMP1
23.  Rostan/Petersen/Lueders      Radical AER           2:12.207  LMP2
24.  Nicolet/Faggionato/Hein      Pescarolo Judd        2:12.692  LMP1
25.  Garcia/Enge                  Aston Martin DBR9     2:16.074  GT1
26.  Alphand/Moreau/Goueslard     Corvette C6.R         2:16.797  GT1
27.  Rusinov/Kox                  Lamborghini           2:17.021  GT1
28.  Blanchemain/Dumez/Lemeret    Corvette C6.R         2:17.998  GT1
29.  Hardman/Leventis             Aston Martin DBR9     2:19.447  GT1
30.  Bell/Bruni                   Ferrari F430 GT       2:21.205  GT2
31.  Lieb/Davison                 Porsche 997 GT3 RSR   2:21.361  GT2
32.  Panis/Lapierre               Courage-Oreca Judd    2:21.775  LMP1
33.  Ehret/Kaffer                 Ferrari F430 GT       2:22.314  GT2
34.  Narac/Lietz                  Porsche 997 GT3 RSR   2:22.332  GT2
35.  Nielsen/Westbrook/Simonsen   Porsche 997 GT3 RSR   2:22.569  GT2
36.  Kutemann/Basso/Daoudi        Ferrari F430 GT       2:23.812  GT2
37.  Dumbreck/Kelleners/Vasiliev  Spyker C8 Laviolette  2:24.482  GT2
38.  Aucott/Ferte                 Ferrari F430 GT       2:24.551  GT2
39.  Daniels/Palttala/Sugden      Porsche 997 GT3 RSR   2:25.109  GT2
40.  Ried/Felbermayr/Felbermayr   Porsche 997 GT3 RSR   2:25.830  GT2
41.  Balandras/Lecourt            Porsche 997 GT3 RSR   2:26.424  GT2
42.  Chiesa/Leuenberger/A. David  Spyker C8 Laviolette  2:26.688  GT2
43.  de Pourtales/Noda            Lola Mazda            No time   LMP2