> Engel, Grenier and Marciello each top their individual sessions
> Back-to-back Intercontinental GT Challenge Powered by Pirelli poles for Mercedes-AMG and GruppeM
> Result: Kyalami 9 Hour Qualifying
Maro Engel, Mikael Grenier and Raffaele Marciello dominated Kyalami 9 Hour qualifying to claim GruppeM Racing and Mercedes-AMG’s second pole position in as many Intercontinental GT Challenge Powered by Pirelli races.
But while it was Engel who starred at Bathurst three weeks ago, this performance owed just as much to the speed of his co-drivers who also topped their respective 15-minute sessions. The trio’s 1m42.617s average was 0.324s faster than the best of Team WRT’s BMWs shared by Dries Vanthoor, home favourite Sheldon van der Linde and Charles Weerts, while Marciello also comfortably clocked the quickest individual lap.
The second BMW of Philipp Eng, Augusto Farfus and Maxime Martin missed the front row by just 0.028s.
Further back, Earl Bamber set the second quickest lap of all but couldn’t prevent SunEnergy1 by SPS from beating Grove Racing to Pro-Am top spot. Their respective Mercedes-AMG and Porsche start sixth and seventh overall just behind Tresor Attempto’s Audis.
Source: Intercontinental GT Challenge
