Kiwis Ryan Yardley and Madeline Stewart start towards the front in the inaugural 992 Endurance Cup at Spa-Francorchamps this weekend, with their respective teams impressing in qualifying.
Yardley’s Mühlner Motorsport squad will start from the AM class pole, in eighth overall, while Stewart’s MRS GT Racing team lines up fourth in Pro/AM, in ninth overall.
Max Kruse Racing secured the overall pole for the 12-hour race, overturning a half-second deficit in the final run of the three-part qualifying to finish with a two-tenth advantage over the Muhlner Motorsport #4.
In changeable conditions, the #4 Mühlner Motorsport Porsche set the fastest time in Q1 by just over seven-tenths, a gap that had only slightly eroded by the end of Q2. However, a flying final run by Paul Meijer, aided by a bold team strategy call to run slick tyres in difficult conditions, was enough to put Max Kruse Racing on top in the final stages.
Heavy fog and intermittent rain during the day led to tricky conditions in the Ardennes. A dry line started to emerge more quickly on certain sectors of the 7.004km circuit than others, splitting strategies across the 27 cars entered for this weekend.
Yardley’s teammate Glenn McGee ran the #21 in Q1 and led the AM class in fourth overall with a 2m 29.557s flyer before the Kiwi took the wheel for Q2 and lowered the team’s average time with a 2m 22.422s effort, which was second in AM class and tenth overall.
Anthony McIntosh finished the job for the team to secure class pole, his 2m 24.501s best giving the Muhlner Motorsport #21 team an average time of 2:25.493, which was over 1.5 seconds to the good of the second-best AM entry, Neuhofer Rennsport, who will line up 12th overall.
Stewart’s MRS GT-Racing #90 team consistently ran in the top five all afternoon and appeared the favourite to take the Pro/AM pole. However, two of Stewart’s best laps in Q3 were disallowed for track limit infringements. She had shown good pace and mixed it with the class front-runners before the penalties.
Stewart’s third-best lap, a 2m 28.683s, stood as her official result, which relegated the team to fourth in class and ninth overall. She is partnering with Therese Lahlouh, Alex Sedgwick and Nik Romano for the race.
Only eight-tenths separated the top four Pro/AM teams.
Qualifying was delayed in Q1 after the #911 Elfer Motorsport entry crashed, bringing a brief red flag.
The 992 Endurance Cup at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps begins at 7.45 pm this evening and will be shown live on YouTube.
Header Image: 992 Endurance Cup
