GT3 Class
Adam Christodoulou put the #63 TORO Racing AMG on pole for the second time this season - a great way to celebrate the team’s return to China GT as a full season entry. Last year’s Shanghai pace-setter Alessio Picariello managed to finish second for EWS Craft-Bamboo Racing, 0.218s off Christodoulou’s times of 2:04.856.
DTM driver Joel Eriksson is a further two tenths down and qualified third for FIST-Team AAI. He shares the second row with fellow BMW works driver Nick Yelloly.
From fifth onwards: Min Heng in the #66 YC Racing AMG, Ivan Lee in the #92 FIST-Team AAI BMW, Sun Zheng in the #7 KINGS Audi.
Kevin Chen proved to be the pace-setter amongst the gentlemen drivers in the second qualifying session, and will start from pole position on Sunday with a time of 2:07.336. He will start alongside Ningbo’s double race winner Lam Yu.
Eric Zang and Jeffrey Lee made an all Mercedes-AMG second row, representing TORO Racing and EWS Craft-Bamboo Racing respectively.
KINGS’ Jiang Tengyi will start ahead of rising star FIST’s Betty Chen, and YC Racing’s Lin Nan.
GTC Class
Aussie John Martin took storming pole on his China GT debut in the #186 YCRT Lamborghini with a time of 2:06.690, about 1.5s quicker than second best, Eagleeyed Racing Team’s Cui Yue. Dominic Ang qualified third in the Radical RXC Turbo for Xtreme Motorsports.
CJ Huang qualified fourth after a spell of mechanical woes in the opening rounds of the 2019 season, but was handed a hefty fine for running the red light at pit exit. From fifth onwards were: Zheng Wancheng of YC Racing, Lo Sze Ho of Xtreme Motorsports, Zhang Zhiqiang of Eagleeyed Racing.
Liu Kai turned Q2 on its head and put the Xtreme Motorsport Radical on pole ahead of YC Racing’s twin Lamborghini’s of Zhou Bihuang and Wang Tao.
Eagleeyed Racing’s Lawrence Liu, Xtreme Motorsports’ Song Bo, YCRT’s Xiao Min and Eagleeyed Racing’s Jeffrey Zee were fourth to seventh on the timesheet.
One-Make Trophy Class
Seven cars made up the largest one-make class grid so far this season. Racing Team 69 was the dominant force in Q1, claiming the top three spots on the grid, with Porsche China Junior Daniel Lu leading the charge ahead of CTCC champion Zhang Zhendong and Ben Rouget.
Sun Zirui qualified fourth for new entry RSR GT Racing, ahead of YCRT’s Wu Pei and the last of the Racing Team 69’s Yang Ke.
Racing Team 69 team boss set a time of 2:14.300 and that was enough to ensure pole position for the #69 on Sunday. YCRT’s sole campaigner Wu Pei is pipped by half a second in P2 and Racing Team 69’s Simon Chan was P3.
RSR GT’s Chien Jui Yu again put the #36 on second row. Racing Team 69’s Steve Yin and Yang Ke occupied the third row.
GT4 Class
Winning Team is now back on top form, being the pace-setter in both qualifying sessions in GT4 class.
McLaren driver Charlie Fagg puts the #570 McLaren 570S on the top of the timesheet with a time of 2:16.544, edging second placed #5 Phantom Pro Racing AMG of Alex Fontana by 0.418s. K2C Motorsports’ Sennan Fielding missed out on the front row by a mere four hundreds of a second.
Fagg’s Winning Team teammate Kenneth Lim qualified fourth ahead of Rainey He’s #6 Phantom Pro AMG. Ling Kang’s Xtreme KTM is about a second off the pace and only managed P6. Rounding out the top 10 were: Yves Volte in the #618 Asia Sonic Racing Aston Martin, Stanley Yang in the #619 AMR, Wang Hao in the #999 Team Master Champ BMW, and Wei Tianyi in the #87 Xtreme KTM.
Fagg’s co-driver, the rapid gentleman racer Dong Liang also set the timesheet alight in the second qualifying session. The 2018 GT4 Am champion stuck the McLaren on pole with a time of 2:17.681.
The second and eighth placed cars were only separated by less than a second, further showing the close competition and high level of performance of the gentleman drivers in the GT4 field. James Cai, who made his China GT debut in 2019, qualified 0.4s behind teammate Dong Liang and made it an all McLaren front row.
The KTMs of Xtreme Motorsports will also start side by side on row 2 with Lo Sze Ho edging Liu Kai by 0.236s.
The third row is occupied by the Phantom Pro Racing AMG’s of Lv Wei, who recently scored second place in the 87th edition of 24 Hours of Le Mans (GTE Am Class), and team boss Chris Chia.
Wang Hao and Yang Xi qualified seventh and eighth for Team Master Champ and Phantom Pro Racing respectively.
Asia Sonic Racing took up the fifth row with #618 David Pun in the new Vantage ahead of #619 Zhang Fangxuan.
