Title defender takes up six hour race from third grid row
Stuttgart. At the wheel of the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR fielded by Felbermayr-Proton, Porsche works drivers Marc Lieb (Germany) and Richard Lietz (Austria) start from the third grid row of the GTE Pro class to tackle the six hour race in Imola on Sunday.
In qualifying for the third race of the Le Mans Series season at the Autodromo Enzo e Dino Ferrari, Richard Lietz posted the sixth fastest time.
“The car handled perfectly for that one fast lap,” he said. “I´m happy with the time, nothing else was possible today. Now let´s hope for a good race. We´re facing six hours of tough work so our motto can only be get a good start and then charge to the front.”
His works driver colleague Patrick Pilet (France) set the ninth fastest time in the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR of IMSA Performance Matmut, which he shares with Wolf Henzler (Germany).
“It wasn´t easy today. You can only turn two really fast laps in qualifying here,” he said. “My first lap was great, but in the second I encountered a lot of traffic and couldn´t improve. The car oversteered a lot, we´ll have to sort this out before the race.”
Directly behind him, Porsche works driver Marco Holzer (Germany) starts from tenth on the grid. His teammate in the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR fielded by ProSpeed Competition is Marc Goossens from Belgium.
“The qualifying began quite well,” said Marco Holzer. “But of all places in the very quick Turn 5 I encountered a slower car which held me up. Our car felt very good, the lap times were much quicker than during the free practice and that makes me feel more confident for the race.”
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