Fred Makowiecki puts Porsche on pole for Motul Sepang 12 Hours 09.12.2016: A blistering lap by Fred Makowiecki in the top-15 shootout put the #912 Manthey Racing Porsche on pole for the 2017 Motul Sepang

A blistering lap by Fred Makowiecki in the top-15 shootout put the #912 Manthey Racing Porsche on pole for the 2017 Motul Sepang 12 Hours, final race of the Intercontinental GT Challenge.




The shootout turned out to be a close-fought affair, with the top-3 cars separated by just two tenths of a second. Alvaro Parente managed to squeeze his #9 K-PAX McLaren in front of the second of the Manthey Racing Porsches, driven by Earl Bamber.
 


No surprises in the hour-long qualifying session, with all GT3-cars going through to the top-15 shootout, together with the two fastest GTC-cars. In the deciding fifteen minutes Alvaro Parente, who had topped most of the free practice sessions, was the first driver of the weekend to break the 2’03-barrier, lapping the 5,542 Sepang International Circuit in 2’02.634.



Even though that was quicker than last year’s pole time, it was not enough to claim the front spot on tomorrow’s grid. Minutes later Fred Makowiecki drove the #912 Manthey Racing Porsche to a time of 2.02.634, enough to claim the best starting position for tomorrow’s race.



The second row will be shared the #911 Manthey Racing Porsche – Earl Bamber fell only 0.086 short of making it an all-Porsche front row – and the #11 Singha Motorsport Ferrari, driven by Carlo Van Dam.




The two Audi Sport Team Phoenix cars, with Intercontinental GT Challenge title contenders Laurens Vanthoor and René Rast, had to be happy with sixth and ninth.





In the GTC class Peter Kox shook the #26 B-Quik Racing Audi by the scruff of its neck to put it on class pole. The Dutchman was over a second quicker than the #67 GDL Racing Team Asia Lamborghini. The fight for the pole in the MARC division was a lot closer, with Jake Camilleri (#93 Mazda 3 V8) edging in front of the #91 Focus V8.



There was another fraternal duel between the two Ginetta cars for pole position in GT4. Even though he had a fast lap time cancelled, Dan Wells still managed to claim the very first GT4-pole in the history of the Motul Sepang 12 Hours, putting the #69 Ayelzo Ecotint G55 just two tenths in front of the #55 sister car of Simpson Motorsport.



The #65 Viper Niza Racing SEAT might be an unfamiliar sight on the Asian racing scene, but Takuya Shirasaka used the car to its fullest extent to claim the TC-pole, even beating some GT4-cars.





In the Touring Car-division the #77 Jim Hunter Motorsport Subaru could not complete the whole qualifying session due to technical issues, but before that team boss Jim Hunter had managed to put his Impreza in front of the other cars in class, even though he only had 0.04 in hand over the #7 Team ST Powered Honda Civic.



The start of the Motul Sepang 12 Hours will be given on Saturday noon (UTC +8), so just after midnight we will know both who will be the winner of the 2017 edition of the Asian endurance classic and who will be the champions of the inaugural Intercontinental GT Challenge.



The race will be streamed live on both the Intercontinental GT Challenge and Motul Sepang 12 Hours websites.

 




- SRO -  Dirk Bogaerts Photography