Allan McNish claimed a debut pole position aboard the new Audi R18 e-tron quattro for Saturday's Spa 6 Hours round of the FIA World Endurance Championship.
The Scot set a best time of 2m01.578s on his second flying lap in the hybrid Audi. That put him just over half a second clear of Marco Bonanomi in the best of the non-hybrid R18 ultras.
McNish, who won the opening WEC round at Sebring with Tom Kristensen and Rinaldo Capello, said: "It is quite a big day for Audi because it has given us our first milestone pole with the e-tron technology. It was quite special for me in particular because myself, Dindo and Tom also took the first pole for the Audi diesel car [at Sebring in 2006]."
Audi blocked out the front two rows of the grid. Marcel Fassler ended up third in the second hybrid R18, while Loic Duval was the final Audi qualifier in the second conventional turbodiesel.
Neel Jani headed the gasoline-fueled privateers in the best of the Rebellion Racing Lola-Toyota coupes. His 2m04.234s lap was nearly three seconds slower than the Audi pole time.
Australian John Martin claimed pole position at the head of the 18-car LMP2 field. His time of 2m09.302s in the ADR-Delta ORECA-Nissan 03 gave him the pole by just four hundredths of a second from James Rossiter in the fastest of the Lotus LMP2 team's two Lolas.
GTE Pro honors went to Frederic Makowiecki in the Luxury Racing Ferrari 458 Italia. The Frenchman ended up four tenths ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella in the lead AF Corse Ferrari.
Imsa Porsche driver Nicolas Armindo pipped Marco Cioci's AF Corse Ferrari to the GTE-Am class pole.