Al Harthy to start European WEC race from front-row

SPA-FRANCORCHAMPS: Oman’s Ahmad Al Harthy delivered another sparkling qualifying performance at Spafrancorchamps on Friday to secure his first LMGT3 frontrow start of the season for today’s third round of the FIA World Endurance Championship campaign.

Going into the weekend fourth in the championship standings along with team-mates Maxime Martin and Valentino Rossi, Al Harthy relished the prospect of being back at Spa, a track where he has enjoyed considerable GT racing success over the years, and he didn’t disappoint in qualifying.

Lapping second fastest around the Ardennes track in the main LMGT3 session, producing a time of 2m21.233 seconds (178.5 km/h), the BMW M4 GT3 driver easily progressed into the allimportant Hyperpole shoot-out to continue his unbroken run of doing so this season.

Al Harthy was able to shave a tenth of a second off that time in Hyperpole shortly after, producing a best of 2m21.138 seconds (178.6 km/h), which secured third on the LMGT3 grid for this afternoon’s Totalenergies 6 Hours of Spa-francorchamps. Following an exclusion for the No.95 Mclaren, though, Al Harthy was elevated onto the front-row, less than 0.4 seconds shy of pole position.

Much of the focus for the squad throughout free practice on Thursday and earlier on Friday, was on delivering the strongest possible car for the race. As a result Al Harthy – who is partnered by OQ, Oman Ministry of Culture, Sports and Youth, Omantel and BMW Oman – was especially pleased with the pace he showed in qualifying trim.

After lapping fifth fastest in the opening free practice, the squad was third quickest in session two and then in session three, the final chance to prepare the car ahead of qualifying, they ended 13th on the times. Ahmad Al Harthy said: “To go through into Hyperpole and to get a front-row grid start here at Spa is very, very good and I’m really happy with that. It puts us in a very good situation to start the race and then, hopefully, we can build on that. The six hours here is very difficult, obviously tyre degradation is much higher and so it’s about managing it for the race.

“We’ve been working a lot in the last few days to make sure we have a good race car.”

“Qualifying was a great surprise, a positive surprise, so we aim to build on that and have a good race and continue the strong start we have made to the season with BMW and Team WRT.”

Round three of the 2024 FIA World Endurance Championship, the Totalenergies 6 Hours of Spa-francorchamps, will get underway at 13.00 local time today.

FIA World Endurance Championship LMGT3 – Rd3 Spa Qualifying Result

Pole – No.85 Iron Dames / Lamborghini Huracan LMGT3

2nd – No.46 Team WRT / BMW M4 LMGT3

3rd – No.91 Manthey EMA / Porsche 911 GT3R LMGT3

4th – No.59 United Autosports / Mclaren 720S LMGT3

5th – No.27 Heart of Racing Team / Aston Martin Vantage LMGT3

6th – No.54 Vista AF Corse / Ferrari 296 LMGT3

FIA World Endurance Championship LMGT3 Driver Standings (after Rd2)

4th Ahmad Al Harthy / Maxime Martin / Valentino Rossi, 36pts