WEC Prologue: Rebellion gets within 0.5s of Toyota

Early on in the four-hour morning session, Mike Conway clocked a time of 1m29.623s in the #7 TS050 Hybrid, some three tenths faster than Tuesday’s benchmark set by Jose Maria Lopez.

Team newcomer Brendon Hartley was second in the sister #8 car with a 1m29.719s, which he set with some 30 minutes remaining.

Rebellion improved on its best time from Tuesday by almost a second, as Gustavo Menezes posted 1m30.110s in the second hour in the #3 Rebellion R-13.

That was just 0.487s shy of Conway's benchmark, with Bruno Senna a further three tenths down in the #1 car.

Ginetta factory squad Team LNT also found significant time around the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya. Charlie Robertson lowered his benchmark to 1m31.006s in the final hour of the morning in the #5 G60-LT-P1, 0.250s clear of Formula 2 racer Luca Ghiotto in the #6 car.

In LMP2, another F2 frontrunner, Nyck de Vries, handed Racing Team Nederland the top spot in the TDS-run #29 Oreca 07.

The Dutchman posted a 1m32.941s, beating Nicolas Lapierre’s early benchmark in the #42 Cool Racing Oreca by one tenth. Will Stevens kept the #37 Jackie Chan DC Racing Oreca in the top-three, another three tenths back.

Ferrari continued to lead the way in GTE Pro as Miguel Molina gradually worked his way down to a 1m43.593s in the #71 AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE.

Kevin Estre placed the all-new Porsche 911 RSR-19 in second, his 1m43.651s just half a tenth shy of the lead. The #51 Ferrari was third by virtue of Alessandro Pier Guidi’s 1m43.945s effort.

Team Project 1 stayed ahead of the field in GTE Am, as Matteo Cairoli led the way with a 1m44.467s in the #57 2018-spec Porsche 911 RSR.

Cairoli also set the second-best time in the #56 sister car, while Ben Barker made it a Porsche 1-2-3 with the #86 Gulf Racing car, staying within half a second of the lead.

The session was interrupted for 12 minutes after an early off for the #47 Cetilar Dallara LMP2 exiting Turn 4, which brought out the red flag.