Mitch Gilbert and Xu Jia of KINGS Racing took convincing GT3 pole, while Race 2 winner Liu Kai and Thomas Ashton of Xtreme Motorsports topped the time sheet in GTC. Winning Team’s David McIntyre and British GT star Charlie Fagg saw off opponents to start on pole for GT4.
GT3 Class
The #1 KINGS Racing Audi managed to quickly recover from a crash on Thursday’s session, and returned to finish ahead of the pack in GT3. Blancpain star Mitch Gilbert had been absolutely dominant in today’s session, claiming not only the fastest lap overall (01:26.980) but also going purple in every sector. With an extra 25kg in success weight, Li Chao and Chris van der Drift of JRM had a tougher time negotiating the undulating Zhejiang circuit but still beat rivals Wang Liang and Martin Rump to start from the front row.
The twin TSRT Audis of David Chen and Michael Choy, and Max Wiser and Billy Lo will start fourth and fifth. D2’s Kuo Kuo Hsin had finished P1 for the Am/Am class, but claimed that more work needs to be done to find the perfect set up. JRM’s Li Jiaqi and Min Heng completed top seven.
GTC Class
Thomas Ashton and Liu Kai carried their winning streak from Zhuhai into Zhejiang. The duo’s combined time of 01:30.944 was enough to put the Xtreme Motorsports Radical on pole ahead of championship leader CJ Huang and teammates Dominic Ang and Song Bo. Huang, however, believed he there is still more time to be found in his Lamborghini with the right set up.
R+ Racing’s Daniel Lu and Wang Tao, and Pan Chao and Shang Lei will start from the back row for tomorrow’s race.
GT4 Class
Winning Team’s David McIntyre, in the new #570 McLaren he shares with works driver and British GT rising star Charlie Fagg, took a convincing pole in GT4 Class with a time of 01:36.210. Second place sitter Team Lotus’ Dominic Ang and Anthony Chan were 0.6s adrift. Zhuhai Round 2 winner Jack Mitchell and Ryan Liu came in third with an average time of 01:37.315 while carrying an extra 50kg in success weight.
Further behind, Fist Team AAI’s Ivan Lee and Kevin Chen were quickest in the Am/Am category, and 1.4s off the pace of the pole-sitting McLaren. Xtreme Motorsports’ Thomas Ashton and Shi Liang, and Winning Team’s Raph Lai and Benjamin Rouget will share the third row. From seventh onwards were Kenny Chung and Sennan Fielding of K2C Motorsport, Zhang Ran and Martin Rump of KINGS Racing, and Yu Zhao and David Pun of China Equity AMR.
Fastest lap in session 1 was set by Dominic Ang (01:34.080), and Ivan Lee in session 2 (01:37.500).
#720 suffered an issue early on and will start from the back.
