Geipel and Lunardi on Silverstone poles

Philip Geipel and Dino Lunardi secured pole positions for the opening races of the 2010 FIA GT3 European Championship at the Silverstone circuit. The Lamborghini and Corvette drivers were quickest in the two qualifying sessions held this morning.



After some rain overnight the session was declared a wet track and it took a few laps before the lap times started to improve. The final minutes of the session saw several drivers taking provisional pole for only a brief moment. Siso Cunill, Daniel Keilwitz and Joe Osborne were all on provisional pole once, but with just over two minutes remaining in the session it was Philip Geipel who posted a 2:04.866. None of the other drivers was able to post a sub 2:05, resulting in the first pole position of 2010 for the Argo Racing Lamborghini

In the second qualifying session it was Dino Lunardi in the number 18 Toni Seiler Racing Corvette who posted the first properly fast lap time in 2:04.576.
All others tried to pass the French driver, but it took until there were only 8,5 minutes left before Martin Ragginger in the number 21 TrackSpeed Porsche was able to go quicker. Ragginger posted a 2:03.636. In the final minutes lap times improved, but only one driver was quicker than Ragginger and that driver was Dino Lunardi again. Improving the time by only 0.098s he secured the pole position for the second race. Ragginger remained in second place, with Christian Hohenadel taking third place.

The session was red flagged with just over a minute left when the BMW Z4 GT3 of Edward Sandström tank-slapped and spun backwards into the gravel, making heavy contact with the barrier.

Source: planetlemans.com