After completing the two evening qualifying sessions yesterday (Thursday 24 July) and this afternoon’s third session, Team Maranello Concessionaires’ two Ferrari 360 N/GT race cars secured first and second positions in class on the grid for the start of tomorrow’s Proximus 24 Hours of Spa race.  Race car number 89 (of Championship leader Jamie Davies, Guy Smith and Darren Turner) completed its quickest lap of the seven km-long circuit in a time of 2.22.691 to secure pole position for the start of tomorrow’s race.  Having set fifth quickest time by the close of yesterday’s evening sessions, car number 88 (of Kelvin Burt, Andrew Kirkaldy and joint Championship leader Tim Mullen), driven by Scotsman Kirkaldy, set the second quickest time of 2.23.028 to secure P2, two tenths of a second ahead of the third place Freisinger Motorsport Porsche of Ortelli/Lieb/Dumas.

TMC enter the sixth round at Spa leading the FIA GT Drivers’ Championship with Jamie Davies and Tim Mullen on 30 points each.  The Brackley-based operation currently lies in second place in the Team Championship with 37 points, just five points behind the leaders.

“There is everything to play for at Spa,” commented Rod Benoist, TMC’s Team Manager.  “We come to Belgium leading the Drivers’ Championship and just a few points behind the leaders in the Teams’ classification.  For obvious reasons, we are very happy with our qualifying performance after last night and today’s sessions.  As Spa is a double-points race, this is our opportunity to strengthen the drivers’ positions and recover the team’s lead.  Our lap times yesterday evening and today are a good indication of our pace and we satisfied now after some further recent test work in the UK that we have our reliability issues resolved.  However, it’s a cliché but true – whilst our starting positions are great news, 24 hours is a long time to race and we remain completely focused on our objectives over the weekend.”   

“This is an exciting start,” continued John Newman, TMC’s Commercial Director.  “We have two journalists with us from ‘Evo’ magazine researching their next article on the team and, as usual, the Sky Sports TV crew are here filming for ‘Ferrari Racing’. What we have already achieved this past two days in readiness for the start of the team’s first 24 hour race should produce some great material for both parties.”