Spa WEC: SMP driver Sirotkin leads newcomer Vandoorne in FP1

Sirotkin, who made his WEC debut for SMP in the Sebring 1000 Miles, set a lap time of 1m56.264s in the #17 BR Engineering BR1-AER with just under 30 minutes of the session remaining.

That followed Vandoorne's lap of 1m58.236s in the sister #11 car, which put the Belgian half a second up on the two Toyota TS050 Hybrids.

SMP's surge pushed the Toyotas down to third and fourth places, with early pacesetter Sebastien Buemi's 1m58.742s putting the #8 car 2.478s off the pace.

Mike Conway was a further four tenths down in the #7 machine and only two tenths up on the quickest of the Rebellion R-13s, the #3 of Gustavo Menezes.

Bruno Senna followed in sixth place in the second of the Rebellions, 4.171s down on Sirotkin.

Seventh overall was the best of the LMP2s, the newly-Michelin-shod Signatech Alpine Oreca entry of Andre Negrao.

The Brazilian driver's 2m03.441s put the #36 car ahead of early pacesetter Jean-Eric Vergne in the Aurus-badged G-Drive Racing Oreca, as well as the remaining LMP1, the ByKolles ENSO CLM P1/01.

Tom Dillmann set the best lap in the Gibson-powered #4 car, more than seven seconds slower the overall benchmark.

GTE Pro was headed by Aston Martin, courtesy of a 2m15.290s laptime from local driver Maxime Martin at the wheel of the #97 Vantage GTE.

Harry Tincknell's last-ditch effort in the quicker of the Ford GTs was identical, but the #67 was classified second, ahead of Antonio Felix da Costa in the #82 BMW M8 GTE.

Ford and Aston Martin's respective second cars were fourth and fifth, ahead of the #81 BMW, while Porsche's pair of 911 RSRs filled out seventh and eighth ahead of the two Ferrari 488 GTEs.

An early lap from Ben Barker put Gulf Racing at the head of the GTE Am times in the Gulf Racing Porsche, less than a tenth ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella in the Spirit of Race Ferrari.

The TF Sport Aston Martin was black-flagged for "constant track limits abuse" while Euan Hankey, returning to the team for the first time since last year's Le Mans 24 Hours, was at the wheel.

FP1 result

Pos	Class	Driver	Team	Car	Gap	Laps
1	LMP1	S.Sarrazin, E.Orudzhev, S.Sirotkin	SMP Racing	BR Engineering/AER	1m56.264s	21
2	LMP1	M.Aleshin, V.Petrov, S.Vandoorne	SMP Racing	BR Engineering/AER	1.972s	29
3	LMP1	S.Buemi, K.Nakajima, F.Alonso	Toyota Gazoo Racing	Toyota	2.478s	40
4	LMP1	M.Conway, K.Kobayashi, J.M.Lopez	Toyota Gazoo Racing	Toyota	2.613s	31
5	LMP1	N.Berthon, T.Laurent, G.Menezes	Rebellion Racing	Rebellion/Gibson	2.842s	33
6	LMP1	N.Jani, A.Lotterer, B.Senna	Rebellion Racing	Rebellion/Gibson	4.171s	29
7	LMP2	N.Lapierre, A.Negrao, P.Thiriet	Signatech Alpine Matmut	Alpine/Gibson	7.177s	31
8	LMP2	R.Rusinov, J.van Uitert, J-E.Vergne	G-Drive Racing	Aurus/Gibson	7.413s	15
9	LMP1	T.Dillmann, O.Webb, P.Ruberti	ByKOLLES Racing Team	ENSO CLM/Gibson	7.627s	12
10	LMP2	F.van Eerd, G.van der Garde, N.de Vries	Racing Team Nederland	Dallara/Gibson	8.085s	32
11	LMP2	R.Gonzalez, P.Maldonado, A.Davidson	DragonSpeed	ORECA/Gibson	8.232s	29
12	LMP2	H-Pin Tung, G.Aubry, S.Richelmi	Jackie Chan DC Racing	ORECA/Gibson	8.352s	30
13	LMP2	D.H.Hansson, J.King, W.Stevens	Jackie Chan DC Racing	ORECA/Gibson	8.643s	33
14	LMP2	F.Perrodo, M.Vaxiviere, N.Nato	TDS Racing	ORECA/Gibson	8.645s	35
15	LMP2	E.Creed, R.Ricci, N.Boulle	Larbre Competition	Ligier/Gibson	10.339s	32
16	GTE Pro	A.Lynn, M.Martin	Aston Martin Racing	Aston Martin	19.026s	32
17	GTE Pro	A.Priaulx, H.Tincknell	Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK	Ford	19.026s	30
18	GTE Pro	A.Farfus, A.F.da Costa	BMW Team MTEK	BMW	19.142s	33
19	GTE Pro	S.Mucke, O.Pla	Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK	Ford	19.384s	29
20	GTE Pro	M.Sorensen, N.Thiim	Aston Martin Racing	Aston Martin	19.990s	34
21	GTE Pro	M.Tomczyk, N.Catsburg	BMW Team MTEK	BMW	20.047s	31
22	GTE Pro	R.Lietz, G.Bruni	Porsche GT Team	Porsche	20.066s	30
23	GTE Pro	M.Christensen, K.Estre	Porsche GT Team	Porsche	20.225s	30
24	GTE Pro	A.P.Guidi, J.Calado	AF Corse	Ferrari	20.235s	28
25	GTE Pro	D.Rigon, S.Bird	AF Corse	Ferrari	20.437s	29
26	GTE Am	M.Wainwright, B.Barker, T.Preining	Gulf Racing	Porsche	20.804s	33
27	GTE Am	T.Flohr, F.Castellacci, G.Fisichella	Spirit of Race	Ferrari	20.874s	35
28	GTE Am	C.Ried, R.Pera, M.Campbell	Dempsey-Proton Racing	Porsche	21.315s	29
29	GTE Am	S.Yoluc, E.Hankey, C.Eastwood	TF Sport	Aston Martin	21.522s	34
30	GTE Am	J.Bergmeister, P.Lindsey, E.Perfetti	Team Project 1	Porsche	21.617s	32
31	GTE Am	P.D.Lana, P.Lamy, M.Lauda	Aston Martin Racing	Aston Martin	21.695s	34
32	GTE Am	G.Roda, G.Roda, M.Cairoli	Dempsey-Proton Racing	Porsche	21.849s	35
33	GTE Am	L.P.-Companc, M.Cressoni, M.Griffin	Clearwater Racing	Ferrari	22.480s	28
34	GTE Am	M.Ishikawa, O.Beretta, E.Cheever	MR Racing	Ferrari	22.546s	33