Ferrari’s Antonio Fuoco Dominates WEC Imola FP3 Session Ahead of BMW and Porsche
In the final practice session before qualifying, Ferrari’s Antonio Fuoco set the pace in the #71 factory Ferrari 499P Le Mans Hypercar, clocking a lap time of 1m31.272s at the Imola circuit on Saturday morning. This impressive performance came after topping Friday’s second practice, solidifying the Italian marque’s strong start to its home WEC round.
Fuoco’s time edged out Dries Vanthoor’s WRT-run #15 BMW M Hybrid V8 LMDh by a narrow margin of 0.034s, while Rene Rast in the #20 BMW M Hybrid V8 LMDh took third, a further three tenths behind.
“This impressive performance came after topping Friday’s second practice, solidifying the Italian marque’s strong start to its home WEC round.”
Robert Shwartzman in the customer AF Corse-run #83 Ferrari, which led the times in opening practice, secured fourth, reinforcing Ferrari’s dominance at Imola. The yellow 499P outpaced the best of the Porsche 963 LMDhs, driven by Matt Campbell, by 0.433s aboard the #5 Penske Porsche Motorsport machine.
Alessandro Pier Guidi, driving the factory #51 Ferrari, overcame a spin at the Villeneuve chicane and a trip into the gravel at Rivazza to claim sixth position with a best time of 1m31.715s. This put him ahead of the leading Toyota GR010 HYBRID LMH of Brendon Hartley, Callum Ilott’s Jota Porsche 963, and Kamui Kobayashi in the second Toyota.
Kevin Estre’s #6 PPM Porsche completed the top 10, leading the two heavily-revised Peugeots that are competing in 2024-spec for the first time this weekend and the two Alpine A424 LMDhs.
In the GT3 class, Marco Sorensen’s blistering pace in his D’Station Racing Aston Martin Vantage earned him top spot with a lap time of 1m42.474s. This put him 0.518s ahead of Alex Riberas in the similar Heart of Racing machine. Augusto Farfus moved up to third in the best of the WRT-run BMW M4s, narrowly missing second spot, while Alexander Malykhin beat Marino Sato’s United Autosports McLaren 720S Evo into fourth aboard his Manthey PureRxcing Porsche 911 GT3-R.
The FIA WEC 2023 calendar continues to heat up as the series heads into its Imola 6 Hours event, promising an action-packed weekend of racing in the picturesque Italian countryside.
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