Audi’s Vanthoor tops crash-shortened final practice

Audi’s Dries Vanthoor set the pace in final practice for the Liqui-Moly Bathurst 12 Hour, which was shortened due to separate late crashes for a Bentley and the Ferrari.

Daniel Serra came unstuck at McPhillamy Park when he lost the rear end of the #27 HubAuto Corsa Ferrari and spun through the gravel trap before hitting the concrete wall in front of the flag point near Skyline.

At around the same time, Oliver Jarvis ran off at The Chase, initially jinking to the inside of the left-hander before running long through the outfield and sliding into a tyre-protected section of the wall to driver’s right of the exit from the complex.

There appeared to be a braking issue in the #8 Bentley Team M-Sport entry.

The red flag was called in the 57th minute of what ws to have been an hour-long session, which did not restart.

Vanthoor therefore remained on top with a 2:03:4430s in the #2 Audi Sport Team Valvoline entry from Marco Mapelli at 0.1060s slower in the #63 Orange1 FFF Lamborghini, the only other ‘three’ of the session.

Proceedings also began with drama, with the presence of multiple kangaroos on the circuit drawing a first minute red flag and effectively causing a 25-minute delay all told.

When the field was finally sent out for the first proper runs, Matteo Cairoli took the lead with a 2:05.4936s in the #912 Absolute Racing Porsche.

He lowered the benchmark to a 2:04.8794s on his second flyer but with many others turning the wick up compared to Friday’s apparent foxing, it was not too long before the pace moved into the mid-fours and even the 2:03s bracket.

Chaz Mostert showed that the #34 Walkenhorst BMW was far more competitive than it might have appeared a day earlier when he lapped Mount Panorama in a 2:04.8559s almost as soon as Cairoli had found a ‘four’, but was quickly usurped by GruppeM’s Raffaele Marciello with a 2:04.3945s in the #999 Mercedes-AMG.

Mapelli made it four different new fastest laps in a single minute with a 2:04.1121s in the #63 Lamborghini, then rolled out a new weekend-best of 2:03.5490s on his next tour.

At the end of the first proper runs it was the Italian ahead of Mostert on a 2:04.2030s and Marciello on a 2:04.3879s, although the latter had gone fastest to the second sector on his way into pit lane in the 16th minute.

Ben Barker slotted into second position with a 2:04.2030s in the #4 Grove Porsche in the 23rd minute, shortly before Matt Campbell put the #911 Absolute Porsche into fourth with a 2:04.2992s.

While the timing screen had settled somewhat, there were nervous moments on the race track when contact between Marcos Gomes (#27 HubAuto Corsa Ferrari) and Sam Shahin at The Chase caused the latter’s #777 Triple Eight Mercedes-AMG to spin, and then when Luca Ghiotto got loose and ran through the gravel trap at McPhillamy Park, barely keeping the #62 R-Motorsport Aston Martin off the wall.

Kelvin van der Linde took up second spot, albeit still more than six tenths away from Mapelli, with a 2:04.1526s in the #222 Valvoline Audi in the 36th minute, and Maximilian Buhk edged the #999 Mercedes-AMG up one position to fifth with a 2:04.2907s around 10 minutes later.

Dries Vanthoor set what would be the fastest lap of the session with just over five of the scheduled 60 minutes remaining, meaning that Audis were first and third on the timesheet courtesy of the Belgian and van der Linde.

The #4 Grove Porsche ended up fourth, from the #34 Walkenhorst BMW, while Alvaro Parente earned sixth for the #60 59Racing McLaren with a 2:04.2834s just before the final red flag.

The Portuguese driver’s effort shuffled the #999 GruppeM Mercedes-AMG back to seventh, ahead of the #911 Absolute Porsche, the #77 Craft-Bamboo Black Falcon Mercedes-AMG, and the #8 Bentley Team M-Sport car.

Earl Bamber Motorsport’s lead car, the #1 Porsche, was 11th courtesy of a 2:04.5549s from Laurens Vanthoor while the #888 Triple Eight Mercedes-AMG was 15th.

Qualifying follows early this afternoon, with Part 1 for all classes from 12:40 local time/AEDT and Part 2 for Class A immediately following at 13:35.

Results: Practice 5

Pos	Num	Team/Sponsor	Driver(s)	Car	Cls	Fastest lap	Split
1	2	Audi Sport Team Valvoline	D.Vanthoor/C.Haase	Audi R8 – LMS GT3	PRO	2:03.4430
2	63	Orange 1 FFF Racing Team	A.Caldarelli/M.Mapelli/D.Lind	Lamborghini Huracan	PRO	2:03.5490	0:00.1060
3	222	Audi Sport Team Valvoline	K.van der Linde/M.Drudi/M.Winkelhock	Audi R8 – LMS GT3	PRO	2:04.1526	0:00.7096
4	4	Team Australia Grove Racing	S.Grove/B.Grove/B.Barker	Porsche GT3 R	PAM	2:04.2030	0:00.7600
5	34	Walkenhorst Motorsport	A.Farfus/N.Catsburg/C.Mostert	BMW M6 GT3	PRO	2:04.2428	0:00.7998
6	60	59Racing/ EMA Racing	A.Parente/B.Barnicoat/T.Blomqvist	McLaren 720S GT3	PRO	2:04.2834	0:00.8404
7	999	Mercedes-AMG GruppeM Racing	F.Fraga/M.Buhk/R.Marciello	Mercedes AMG GT3	PRO	2:04.2907	0:00.8477
8	911	Absolute Racing	M.Jaminet/P.Pilet/M.Campbell	Porsche GT3 R	PRO	2:04.2992	0:00.8562
9	77	Mercedes-AMG Craft-Bamboo	M.Engel/L.Stolz	Mercedes AMG GT3	PRO	2:04.3939	0:00.9509
10	7	Bentley Team M-Sport	J.Gounon/M.Soulet/J.Pepper	Bentley Continental	PRO	2:04.5295	0:01.0865
11	1	Earl Bamber Motorsport	E.Bamber/L.Vanthoor	Porsche GT3 R	PRO	2:04.5549	0:01.1119
12	912	Absolute Racing	D.Werner/M.Cairoli/T.Preining	Porsche GT3 R	PRO	2:04.5818	0:01.1388
13	18	KCMG	J.De Oliveira/E.Liberati/A.Imperatori	Nissan GTR Nismo GT	PRO	2:04.7373	0:01.2943
14	22	Audi Sport Team Valvoline	G.Tander/M.Bortolotti	Audi R8 – LMS GT3	PRO	2:04.7508	0:01.3078
15	888	Mercedes-AMG Team Triple Eight	S.van Gisbergen/J.Whincup/M.Goetz	Mercedes AMG GT3	PRO	2:04.7548	0:01.3118
16	12	NED Racing Team	D.Calvert-Jones/R.Dumas	Porsche GT3 R	PAM	2:04.7953	0:01.3523
17	6	Wall Racing	A.D’Alberto/C.McConville	Lamborghini Huracan	SIL	2:04.8793	0:01.4363
18	76	R – Motorsport	J.Dennis/R.Kelly/S.Dixon	Aston Martin Vantage	PRO	2:05.0660	0:01.6230
19	59	59Racing	D.Storey/F.Ross/M.Kodric	McLaren 720S GT3	SIL	2:05.1741	0:01.7311
20	27	Hub Auto Corsa	M.Gomes/D.Serra	Ferrari 488 GT3	PRO	2:05.2611	0:01.8181
21	777	The Bend Motorsport Park	Y.Shahin/N.Foster/A.De Pasquale/S.Shahin	Mercedes AMG GT3	PAM	2:05.3296	0:01.8866
22	62	R – Motorsport	L.Ghiotto/M.Kirchhoefer/O.Caldwell	Aston Martin Vantage	PRO	2:05.6276	0:02.1846
23	8	Bentley Team M-Sport	A.Buncombe/O.Jarvis/S.Morris	Bentley Continental	PRO	2:05.6735	0:02.2305
24	75	SunEnergy1 Racing	D.Baumann/M.Konrad	Mercedes AMG GT3	PAM	2:05.7474	0:02.3044
25	30	Honda Racing	D.Cameron/R.van der Zande/M.Farnbacher	Acura/ Honda NSX GT3	PRO	2:05.8158	0:02.3728
26	46	Black Falcon	P.Assenheimer/S.Afanasiev/M.Beretta	Mercedes AMG GT3	SIL	2:05.9664	0:02.5234
27	188	Garage 59	A.West/C.Goodwin/M.Martin	Aston Martin Vantage	PAM	2:06.2855	0:02.8425
28	159	Garage 59	Roman De Angelis	Aston Martin Vantage	SIL	2:06.8938	0:03.4508
29	91	Scandia Racer Industries	A.Cameron/B.Feeney/N.Percat	MARC II	INV	2:07.0295	0:03.5865
30	29	Trofeo Motorsport	L.Talbot/M.Zalloua/G.Denyer	Lamborghini Huracan	SIL	2:07.3836	0:03.9406
31	20	Local Search	A.Hargraves/C.Sbirrazzuoli	MARC II	INV	2:07.9979	0:04.5549
32	96	Hobson Motorsport	B.Hobson/K.Kostecki	Nissan GT-R NISMO GT	SIL	2:08.2733	0:04.8303
33	92	Scandia Racer Industries	H.Morrall/J.Kaye	MARC II	INV	2:09.6737	0:06.2307
34	24	Bostik Australia	Geoff Emery	Audi R8 – LMS GT3	SIL	2:10.9059	0:07.4629
35	95	MARC Cars Australia	G.Taunton/B.Hall/W.Luff/B.Schumacher	MARC II	INV	2:11.9286	0:08.4856
36	9	Hallmarc	M.Cini/D.Fiore/L.Holdsworth	Audi R8 – LMS GT3	PAM	2:12.4808	0:09.0378
37	13	JET Battery Services	D.Jorgensen/B.Strom/D.van Dongen	BMW M4 GT4	GT4	2:16.1060	0:12.6630
38	19	usedtrucks.com.au	M.Griffith/H.Newey	Mercedes AMG GT4	GT4	2:18.5892	0:15.1462