Peugeot heads Audi in warm-up
Peugeot turned the tables on Audi for the first time during the Spa 1000km weekend as Franck Montagny set the pace in morning warm-up
The Frenchman's time of 2m03.744s was set on his second lap of the 20-minute session, and ensured that the car he shares with Nicolas Minassian and Stephane Sarrazin took the top spot by a second from the Marcel Fassler/Andre Lotterer/Benoit Treluyer Audi.
There was a scary moment for Montagny in the dying minutes, however as he and Olivier Panis both came across the GTE Pro class AF Corse Ferrari of Toni Vilander on the run up to Les Combes.
While Panis passed on the left hand side in his ORECA Peugeot, the Ferrari moved from the middle of the track to the right, almost putting Montagny's car onto the grass at high speed and forcing the factory driver to back off.
Anthony Davidson and Sebastien Bourdais made it three works Peugeots in the top five, sandwiching Tom Kristensen's fourth-placed Audi, while Romain Dumas was sixth in the pole-sitting R18.
Soheil Ayari put the Signatech ORECA on top of the pile in LMP2, knocking the Strakka HPD off the top spot with a late effort. Jonny Kane had put the car he shares with Danny Watts and Nick Leventis on top early on.
Prior to his close shave with Montagny, Vilander had gone quickest in GTE Pro, and his time proved good enough to keep him there too. Allan Simonsen was second quickest in his Farnbacher Ferrari while Marco Holzer (Prospeed) was the best of the Porsche drivers in third.
Raymond Narac/Nicolas Armindo set the pace in GTE Am for IMSA Porsche while the quickest Formula Le Mans driver was Olivier Lombard in his JMB ORECA.
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