Proton Competition driver Ben Barker mastered qualifying practice for the 24 Hours of Le Mans which also marks the event debut of the Ford Mustang GT3.
The Ford factory driver asserted his form early on during the 1-hour session whereby all 62 cars across three classes fought for their respective top-eight positions.
In the LMGT3 category, 22 entrants fought for the top-eight positions in Hyperpole, with the 23rd non-participating car being the #86 GR Racing Ferrari 296.
This was due to an electronics issue experienced by Mike Wainwright during the first free practice session, and so the team conducted an ECU change qualifying practice in attempts to solve the issue otherwise a possible engine change could occur.
Barker set an impressive, pole-sitting benchmark on the Le Mans debut of the Ford Mustang GT3, specifically behind the wheel of the #77 Proton Competition entry.
His lap time of 3:55.263 was untouched by any other competitor throughout the session since setting it early on, as six manufacturers were represented in the top-eight.
Both of Lamborghini’s Huracan GT3 EVO2 and Aston Martin’s AMR Vantages resided in the top-eight, as the attention was especially on Iron Dame Michelle Gatting with her efforts to get the pink car into Hyperpole.
Unfortunately towards the closing stages of the session, especially with the red flag declared due to Kobayashi’s incident, Larry ten Voorde of the #66 JMW Motorsport Ferrari 296 jumped into seventh and therefore knocked out the Iron Dames.
Making it into tomorrow’s 30-minute Hyperpole session will be the #77 Proton Competition Ford Mustang GT3, followed by the #70 Inception Racing McLaren 720S (3:55.406), and Daniel Juncadella (3:56.105) in third for the #82 TF Sport Corvette Z06 GT3.R.
Fourth place was taken by Franck Perera’s #60 Iron Lynx Lamborghini Huracan with a 3:56.153 lap time, followed by Klaus Bachler’s #92 Manthey PureRxing Porsche 911 LMGT3.R in fifth.
Alex Riberas secured sixth place with a 3:56.243 as in seventh position was the only Ferrari in the top-eight, Larry ten Voorde, with credit to a laptime of 3:56.443.
D’station racing driver Marco Sorensen put the #777 Aston Martin Vantage AMR in eighth by the end with his 3:56.500.
To their misfortune, the #85 Iron Dames Lamborghini narrowly lost out to Hyperpole with their fastest time being a 3:56.530.
I just wonder what kind of hurdle the Corvettes are going to have to jump,this year. Every year this race gets harder to watch through all the stupidity!!!!