James Calado leads the 6 Hours of Imola for Ferrari, in the #51 car, with an hour gone, with his fellow Ferrari driver, Phil Hanson, second in the satellite #83 Ferrari 499P.
Calado started on pole after his teammate in the #51 car, Antonio Giovinazzi, qualified the car fastest yesterday. He retained the lead on the first lap from Hanson and now has a three second gap over his countryman.
Kevin Magnussen is third, 16 seconds back from Calado, after starting the #15 BMW M Hybrid V8 third. He is gradually pulling away from the two Toyotas, in fourth and fifth.
Brendon Hartley, in the fourth-placed #8 Toyota, started fifth but moved ahead of his teammate Mike Conway, in the #7 car, in a team orders move. The two swapped amidst GT3 traffic after Tosa corner, up the hill.
The #93 Peugeot, driven by Paul di Resta, was sixth before the pitstops. The Scot started seventh but jumped ahead of Fred Makowiecki in the #36 Alpine at the start, fighting over the position for most of the first hour along with Makowiecki’s teammate Ferdinand Habsburg in eighth.
But the Austrian received a drive through penalty for a full course yellow procedure infringement, dropping him back down the field.
Behind the Alpine, Will Stevens, in the #12 Cadillac, also received a drive through.
The Hypercars have recently made their first pitstops, with most teams not choosing to change tyres and just take fuel. The weather is currently overcast, helping tyre wear and tyre temperatures. Behind the leading five, unchanged since the stops, is Rene Rast in sixth in the #20 BMW. The #50 Ferrari of Nicklas Nielsen is seventh, which started last after having their qualifying lap deleted for track limits yesrerday, with Laurens Vanthoor eighth in the #6 Porsche.
Al Harthy leads for BMW in LMGT3
In LMGT3, Ahmad Al Harthy leads after starting on pole in the #46 WRT BMW M4 GT3. He lost the lead on track, at the first corner of Tamburello, to Francois Heriau in the #21 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3, but Heriau pitted with 55 minutes to go to give Al Harthy the lead once again.
Second and third in class are the two ASP Lexus machines, the #87 car with Petru Umbrarescu at the wheel ahead of the #78 team car of Arnold Robin.
After the pitstops, Al Harthy jumped ahead of Heriau to retain the lead as the Ferrari had a 5-second penalty for race start procedures.
Ben Keating, in the #33 TF Sport Corvette and Celia Martin in the #85 Iron Dames Porsche, caused the aforementioned full course yellow when Martin tried to overtake the American into Tamburello at the start of the lap. Unfortunately, she made the move to the inside a little late and Keating did not see her time, not giving space as he mounted the kerb. The Corvette spun into the gravel while Martin continued, and although Keating managed to escape, it kicked gravel all over the track, requiring a short full course yellow for marshals to sweep the track clean.
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