Raffaele Marciello (27/I) struck with the Mamba once again. The Mercedes-AMG works driver of Mann-Filter Team Landgraf was the fastest driver in the first qualifying session at the Nürburgring on Saturday morning, with a time of 1:25.544 minutes that saw him set a new ADAC GT Masters qualifying record. In addition to the Pirelli Pole Position Award, he clinched three bonus points for the overall standings for himself and his team-mate Maro Engel (36/Monte Carlo), thereby reducing his deficit to the leaders to ten points.
“I’m really happy. It’s been a great week so far with the win in Spa and now pole position in the ADAC GT Masters. I had fun on the track, and not much traffic, which meant I was able to drive a lap as fast as that,” said Raffaele Marciello after his fourth pole position in the ADAC GT Masters.
The first qualifying session on the fourth stop of the German GT Championship tour got underway in glorious sunshine, but with cool temperatures of twelve degrees, at the Nürburgring at 9:00 CEST on Saturday morning. The drivers needed several laps to bring the tyres to the optimum temperature range, meaning that it wasn’t until halfway through qualifying that the thrilling race against time started. The lead changed several times, with Raffaele Marciello finally positioning himself at the top on lap eight, and driving the fastest time of the day one lap later. Trailing by 0.186 seconds, his brand colleague Fabian Schiller (24/Troisdorf) of Drago Racing Team ZVO finished in second place, giving himself and Jules Gounon (27/F) a very good starting position for the seventh race in the ADAC GT Masters.
Ayhancan Güven (24/TR) of Team Joos Sportwagentechnik picked up where he had left off in the free practice session on Friday, completing a lap of the 3.629-kilometre track in the Eifel region in the Porsche 911 GT3 R #91 with the third-fastest time. The resulting bonus point saw him and Christian Engelhart (35/Starnberg) take the lead in the overall standings. This gives the driver duo a strong chance of topping the table halfway through the German GT Championship. Next to the Porsche, the Elias Seppänen (18/FIN) and Frank Bird (22/GB) with the Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo #84 of Mann-Filter Team Landgraf will start the race from fourth on the grid. Patric Niederhauser (30/CH) finished fifth in the Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II with car number 15 of Rutronik Racing, which he shares with Luca Engstler (22/Wiggensbach). A total of 18 cars were within a second of each other in the first qualifying session.
