Buus and Feller set the pace at Barcelona as Boutsen VDS tops second practice
Lionspeed is fastest in the morning, Robin Knutsson tops the afternoon for Boutsen VDS, and Engel and Auer are the only title contenders in the top five twice.
Bastian Buus and Ricardo Feller started the GT World Challenge Europe Sprint Cup finale at Barcelona the way championship leaders should: fastest in the first free practice session with a 1:40.389 in their Lionspeed GP Porsche. In the afternoon the order changed. Robin Knutsson topped Free Practice 2 with a 1:54.557 in the Boutsen VDS Porsche he shares with Gilles Magnus, while Buus was seventh in the Lionspeed car.
Buus and Feller lead the Sprint Cup by 5.5 points and could already seal the title on Saturday, SRO said after the morning session. Their closest rivals spent Friday spread across the timesheets.
Fastest in the morning, seventh in the afternoon
In Free Practice 1, Buus was 0.219 seconds clear of Alex Aka in the Tresor Attempto Audi, the fastest Gold Cup car. Lucas Auer was third for Winward Racing, 0.285 seconds down, with Andrea Frassineti fourth as the best Silver Cup driver and Marvin Dienst fifth as the fastest in Bronze. All 44 cars set a time. The session was briefly stopped when the number 84 Eastalent Racing Audi went into the gravel; the car returned to the track.
Free Practice 2, which started at 13:55, ran on a very different level. Knutsson’s best lap was some 14 seconds slower than the morning benchmark, and the whole field was in that range. The live timing shows that almost every car set its best lap on its second or third lap; only a few improved later, such as Dorian Boccolacci on lap 21. The official results do not say why, so the afternoon says more about the order than about outright pace.
In that order, Knutsson finished 0.448 seconds ahead of Dienst in the Winward Mercedes-AMG he shares with Rinat Salikhov, again the best Bronze Cup crew. Ben Green set the third time in the Emil Frey Ferrari he shares with Thierry Vermeulen, the best of the Pro cars, 0.608 seconds down.
Where the title contenders ended up
Eight crews arrived in Barcelona with a mathematical chance of the title, as we explained in our preview of the title fight. This is how the contenders did on Friday:
| Crew | Car | Points before Barcelona | FP1 | FP2 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Buus / Feller | #80 Lionspeed GP Porsche | 59 | 1st | 7th (+0.929) |
| Leclerc / Neubauer | #50 AF Corse Ferrari | 53.5 | outside top 12 | 18th (+1.323) |
| Juncadella / Lulham | #3 Mercedes-AMG Team Verstappen Racing | 53 (Juncadella) | 9th (+0.660) | 12th (+1.094) |
| Van der Linde / Weerts | #32 Team WRT BMW | 50 | outside top 12 | 31st (+2.492) |
| Engel / Auer | #48 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG | 42.5 | 3rd (+0.285) | 4th (+0.779) |
| Green / Vermeulen | #69 Emil Frey Racing Ferrari | 40 | outside top 12 | 3rd (+0.608) |
| Müller / Boccolacci | #2 Boutsen VDS Porsche | Boccolacci 33 behind | 7th (+0.636) | 5th (+0.886) |
| Rossi / Hesse | #46 Team WRT BMW | 25.5 behind | 10th (+0.776) | 29th (+2.335) |
Gap to the fastest car in each session. Source: official GT World Challenge Europe results.
Of the title contenders, only Auer and Maro Engel’s Winward Mercedes-AMG was in the top five of both sessions, as was Winward’s Bronze Cup car of Dienst and Salikhov. Kelvin van der Linde and Charles Weerts, fourth in the standings, were 31st in the afternoon, and Valentino Rossi and Max Hesse dropped from tenth to 29th.
Second practice classification
| Pos | Car | Drivers | Team | Cup | Time | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 10 | Gilles Magnus, Robin Knutsson | Boutsen VDS | Gold | 1:54.557 | – |
| 2 | 87 | Marvin Dienst, Rinat Salikhov | Winward Racing | Bronze | 1:55.005 | +0.448 |
| 3 | 69 | Thierry Vermeulen, Ben Green | Emil Frey Racing | Pro | 1:55.165 | +0.608 |
| 4 | 48 | Lucas Auer, Maro Engel | Winward Racing | Pro | 1:55.336 | +0.779 |
| 5 | 2 | Sven Müller, Dorian Boccolacci | Boutsen VDS | Pro | 1:55.443 | +0.886 |
| 6 | 74 | Dennis Marschall, Constantin Dressler | Kessel Racing | Bronze | 1:55.476 | +0.919 |
| 7 | 80 | Bastian Buus, Ricardo Feller | Lionspeed GP | Pro | 1:55.486 | +0.929 |
| 8 | 89 | Nicolas Baert, Gustav Bergström | Lionspeed GP | Silver | 1:55.569 | +1.012 |
| 9 | 12 | Fabian Schiller, Gabriel Rindone | GetSpeed Team Dubai | Bronze | 1:55.570 | +1.013 |
| 10 | 59 | Joseph Loake, Dean Macdonald | Garage 59 | Pro | 1:55.574 | +1.017 |
Top ten of 44 cars. The full results are on the official GT World Challenge Europe website.
Further down, Gaspard Simon, the first SRO GT Academy winner, was 36th with Maxime Robin in his last weekend of the season (read his story). Jop Rappange and David Pittard were not classified in the KPX Motorsport BMW, with a best lap of 2:44.563, and the number 6 GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG of Aurelien Panis and Anthony Bartone did not take part in the session.
Our read
Friday practice in a title decider rarely shows the full picture. Teams run their own programmes, and nobody wants to show qualifying pace a day early. Still, Buus and Feller did exactly what leaders need to do: fastest in the morning, inside the top ten in the afternoon, no drama.
The crew that should worry them most is not the one second in the standings. Engel and Auer were the only contenders in the top five twice. With 42.5 points they need a lot to go their way, but if any rival is going to take points off the Porsche on Saturday, the Mercedes-AMG looks like the candidate.
Do Buus and Feller seal the Sprint Cup title on Saturday, or does it go down to the last race on Sunday? Tell us in the comments.
Qualifying and Race 1 on Saturday
Qualifying 1 starts on Saturday at 09:45 local time, with Race 1 at 14:00. Qualifying 2 follows on Sunday at 11:10 and the final race at 16:00. Check the full entry list, the standings after Zandvoort and our GT World Challenge Europe explainer, and follow the weekend on our live blog.
