Arjun Maini (Haupt Racing Team) produced the perfect lap at the Hockenheimring. The Indian smashed the previous qualifying record for the ADAC GT Masters, recording a time of 1:36.961 minutes to secure his first pole position. “Mega! The team has given me a real rocket. I worked very hard on my warm-up laps to get the Pirelli tyres up to the right temperature. Then everything came together perfectly on the lap. The balance of the car, in particular, was outstanding. I am very happy,” said the pole-sitter. Maini earned himself and his team-mate Petru Umbrarescu (RO) the perfect starting position for race two of the season. Second place in qualifying went to Elias Seppänen (FIN) of Landgraf Motorsport in another Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo.
The former Formula 1 circuit was bathed in sunshine on Sunday morning, with temperatures around 23 degrees Celsius making for perfect conditions. A real thriller played out in the closing stages of the 20-minute session. Maini’s pole position did look at risk as Seppänen put everything into one attempt, but the Finn ultimately missed out on the fastest time by 0.1 seconds. Sven Müller (Bingen) took third place in a Porsche 911 GT3 R run by Team Joos by RACEmotion (+0.127 seconds). Fourth place went to Lamborghini works driver Marco Mapelli (GRT Grasser-Racing-Team) from Italy (+0.343 seconds). Rounding off the top five was Jaxon Evans (NZ/Huber Racing) in a Porsche 911 GT3 R: the winner of the opening race of the season was roughly 0.4 seconds off Maini’s pole-setting time.
Sport1 is broadcasting the second race of the season live and in full. The on-air team, led by presenter Ruth Hofmann and commentator Peter Kohl, goes live at 12:45. The 60-minute sprint race is also being shown on a free livestream at youtube.com/@ADACMotorsports. The race gets underway at 13:00.
