Jules Gounon (27/F) appears to be in a different league at the Sachsenring. After victory alongside Fabian Schiller (25/Troisdorf) on Saturday, the Frenchman upped his game again in qualifying on Saturday. The 2017 ADAC GT Masters champion set a new qualifying record for the German GT Championship at the Sachsenring, posting a blistering time of 1:17.551 minutes in the #4 Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo run by Drago Racing Team ZVO. His magical lap was over half a second faster than the second-placed car and smashed the previous record, set yesterday by championship leader Raffaele Marciello (27/CH).
“The car was fantastic this morning. I am just really enjoying being back in a racing car after my injury, and I love the Sachsenring. With this pole position, and after Saturday’s success, we now have the opportunity to close in on the top of the table,” said the winner of the Pirelli Pole Position Award, who currently lies third in the championship together with his partner Schiller.
The pole-sitter was followed by three Audis in positions two to four. Second place, 0.555 seconds slower than Gounon, was Christopher Mies (33/Düsseldorf) in the #1 Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II of Montaplast by Land-Motorsport. Fellow Audi driver Dennis Marschall (26/Eggenstein) from the Rutronik Racing team starts the race from third on the grid in the number 27 car. Dries Vanthoor (24/B) guided the #29 Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II #29 to fourth place for Montaplast by Land-Motorsport. The best-placed Lamborghini driver was Marco Mapelli (35/I) from Paul Motorsport in fifth. While the #48 Mercedes-AMG GT3 of championship leader Raffaele Marciello (27/CH) could qualified seventh with Daniel Juncadella (31/E) at the wheel, the second-placed car in the championship, the #91 Porsche 911 GT3 R of Christian Engelhart (35/Starnberg) and Ayhancan Güven (24/TR), will start Sunday’s race from down in 15th place.
Qualifying started similarly to yesterday’s session at 08:50 on Sunday morning. A good eight minutes elapsed before the field went in pursuit of the perfect lap. Jules Gounon set his remarkable time on his sixth lap, after which no other driver got near to the Frenchman.
Race eleven of the ADAC GT Masters season starts at 13:00. The action can be followed live on adac.de/motorsport and motorsport.tv.
