Spa 24 Hours: Lamborghini loses pole for engine infringement

The K-Pax Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo in which Andrea Caldarelli topped the times in Superpole qualifying on Friday has been excluded from the session after failing scrutineering.

The operating parameters of the Lamborghini’s engine were found not be in line with those when the Balance of Performance test was undertaken ahead of the season.

Caldarelli’s times from the session in the car he shares with Marco Mapelli and Jordan Pepper have been cancelled and the car given a 10-place grid penalty for the double-points round of the GT World Challenge Europe.

That means the K-Pax Lambo will start from 30th position on the grid, 10 places behind the 20 cars that made it through to Superpole from opening qualifying on Thursday.

The team has also been fined €25,000 for the infraction.

The removal of the Lamborghini’s time has promoted Raffaele Marciello to pole position in the lead Auto Sport Promotion Mercedes-AMG GT3.

It means the Italian Mercedes has now claimed a hat-trick of poles for the Spa GTWCE blue riband round together with ASP.

#88 AMG Team AKKODIS ASP Mercedes-AMG GT3: Raffaele Marciello, Daniel Juncadella, Jules Gounon

Photo by: Eric Le Galliot

The GetSpeed Mercedes in which Luca Stolz took third in Superpole will now take move up to the front row alongside the ASP Merc.

The technical delegate reported that the engine airbox pressure and the calculated torque taken from the engine control unit of the K-Pax Lamborghini were “not in line with the BoP test collected figures”, according to the stewards’ bulletin announcing the penalties.

“It is also reported that the air filters used by car #6 are not in line with the ones used during the BoP test”, the report continued.

The stewards accepted the arguments of the team and a representative from Lamborghini that the specification of the K-Pax car during qualifying was in line with the Huracan’s operating manual.

But after studying data and photographic evidence, the stewards determined that K-Pax has still breach the GTWCE sporting regulations.

The Spa 24 Hours Endurance Cup round of the GTWCE starts at 16:45 local time.