The American went into the lead shortly before the end of the session with a lap time of 1.22.128 minutes. "We started on used tyres and worked on setup," said De Phillippi. "We bolted on fresh tyres towards the end to get a feel for the car's balance. Of course, it's always nice to be in the lead, but we must improve the car even more for qualifying."

Mercedes-AMG driver Luca Stolz (21, DEU) was just 0.2 seconds slower as Stefan Mücke (36, DEU) and Sebastian Asch (30, DEU) in another Mercedes-AMG GT3 finished directly behind them followed by their BWT-Mücke Motorsport team-mates, Filip Salaquarda (33, CZ) and Markus Winkelhock (36, DEU) in an Audi R8 LMS. Mercedes and Audi also took positions five and six. The Mercedes-AMG pairing of Patrick Assenheimer (25, DEU) and Maximilian Götz (31, DEU, both Mercedes-AMG Team HTP Motorsport) came home in front of Audi drivers Jeffrey Schmidt (23, CH) and Christopher Haase (29, DEU, both Montaplast by Land-Motorsport).

Once again, the gaps between cars were very close during the session with barely one second covering 16 cars. The 18 outfits contesting the Super Sports Car League now have very little time - just less than two hours since the end of practice - to prepare for the first race against the clock which begins at 5.50 pm when grid slots will be decided for Saturday's race at the Lausitzring.