The Belgian Marc VDS squad claimed pole position for the Spa 24 Hours with its new BMW Z4.
Maxime Martin jumped to the top of the times as the 4.35-mile Spa circuit dried in the final minutes of the rain-interrupted qualifying sessions on Thursday evening. The FIA GT1 World Championship regular set the pole with a 2m24.488s lap, which put him 0.2sec ahead of Maxime Soulet in the best of the Prospeed Porsche 911 GT3-Rs.
Martin said pole position for the prestigious round of the Blancpain Endurance Series was a big achievement for Marc VDS, which has swapped from the Ford GT to the BMW Z4 GT3 for this race.
"I'm happy because we only received the car one month ago; it's really the first time we're driving the car and have been having problems with it," said Martin, who shares with Bas Leinders and Marc Hennerici. "It was the first time in dry conditions, but the car was good. It was a tricky lap but we did it."
Paolo Ruberti took third in the Autorlando Porsche from Peter Kox's Retier Lamborghini. The top Audi driver was Mattias Ekstrom in the Audi Sport WRT team's lead entry in seventh place.