Tomas Enge and Darren Turner dominated the qualifying race at the Nurburgring round of the FIA GT1 World Championship aboard their Young Driver AMR Aston Martin DBR9.
Enge briefly dropped to third at the start after being tapped into a half-spin, but the Czech driver was quickly back to second and needed less than three laps to take the lead from Alex Margaritis in the Phoenix/Carsport Chevrolet.
Such was the advantage of the best of the Aston Martins at the Nurburgring that Enge was able to pull out a four-second lead before the pitstop window opened in the middle of the one-hour race.
Turner resumed with a similar gap over the Phoenix/Carsport car, now driven by Marc Hennerici, only to return to the pits three laps later for wet tires when it started to rain. The Briton retook the lead with six laps to go when he passed Andrea Bertolini in the best of the Vitaphone Maseratis, which was still on slicks.
"It was one of those races where you had to keep an eye on your mirrors and just try to stay on the track," said Turner.
Margaritis and Hennerici ended up second, just over 10sec behind the winning Aston and a similar margin ahead of the third-placed Reiter Lamborghini Murcielago driven by Christophe Haase and Peter Kox. The Bertolini Maserati, which was started by Michael Bartels, faded to 10th at the finish.
Results to follow