Gounon Gives Mercedes-AMG Team Winward Racing Indy 8 Hour Pole
It wasn’t without some manner of controversy or confusion before the Pole Shootout even began, but when the chequered flag finally waved after the last time trial session, the #33 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 of Jules Gounon, Russell Ward, and Philip Ellis won the pole position for tomorrow’s third annual running of the Indianapolis 8 Hour Race.
In the hours between the end of the initial Qualifying sessions, and the scheduled start of the Pole Shootout at 4:55 PM EDT, there was immense drama.
First, the #94 BimmerWorld BMW M4 GT3 (Chandler Hull/Richard Heistand/Bill Auberlen) was kicked out of the shootout after Auberlen was stripped of his lap times in Qualifying Driver 3, for causing two collisions with Miguel Molina’s #51 AF Corse Ferrari.
This was one of three post-qualifying penalties, but the only one which impacted the Pole Shootout order, and it moved ST Racing’s BMW into the Pole Shootout in their place.
Then, with minutes to go before the start of the session, Craft-Bamboo Racing and AF Corse-Francorchamps brought their #77 Mercedes and #71 Ferrari out to the pit lane in preparation for the shootout – which was only alarming for the small reason that neither car was able to have all three of its drivers set a time.
Raffaele Marciello of Craft-Bamboo Racing and Daniel Serra of AF Corse had yet to set a time before the red flag was shown in Qualifying Driver 1. Their respective teams – along with SunEnergy1 with Akkodis ASP – brought their cars onto pit lane, as they appealed to Race Control that only the fastest two drivers’ averages should be counted as Driver 1 Qualifying was interrupted before ten minutes could be run, citing Article 42.21 of the Sporting Regulations.
However, their appeal was eventually rejected – Race Control, while acknowledging that the protests were well-founded, determined all teams had enough time to ensure all their drivers could set a time. And the ten-car lineup for this final part of qualifying was confirmed. This unbelievable saga brought on a 15 minute delay, before the Pole Shootout finally began at ten minutes past the hour.
The Ferrari 488 GT3s wasted little time moving to the front of the pack. The #34 Conquest Racing Ferrari of Alessandro Balzan and the #23 Triarsi Competizione Ferrari of Alessio Rovera traded fastest laps to start. Jordan Pepper in the #3 K-PAX Racing Lamborghini Huracán GT3 briefly supplanted them from the top spot, before Balzan and Rovera jumped back up into the top two.
The margins were incredibly small. Rovera was sitting on a 1’22.283 after six minutes, then, Balzan improved to a time of 1’22.242 to take back the provisional pole. And with five minutes left, Balzan seemed assured of pole position on behalf of Conquest Racing.
But the final minutes offered a chance at redemption for Gounon. In Qualifying Driver 1, he had a time that was tracking towards the fastest lap in the session before it was annulled by the red flag. This time, the young second-generation driver who has won every Intercontinental GT Challenge race held in the calendar year of 2022, wouldn’t be denied.
Gounon roared past Rovera, Balzan, and the lot with a time of 1’21.195, and then found five thousandths of a second on his next lap to ultimately clock in at 1’21.190 for the pole position. It’s Mercedes-AMG’ second straight IGTC pole, putting them in prime position to wrap up the Manufacturers’ Championship tomorrow night.
And for Gounon, it’s the chance to extend his winning streak to four IGTC races – and in doing so, clinch his first Drivers’ Championship.
“We just wanted to maximize the performance of the car,” Gounon said from pit lane after his qualifying run. “Warming up the brakes to a maximal temperature and extracting the maximum of the car on the new tyres were part of that strategy. I want to thank Winward Racing for preparing such a great car. The 8 Hour is a long race, but it’s a good feeling to be in pole position at Indianapolis.”
Balzan narrowly missed out on giving Indianapolis-based Conquest Racing the pole by just 0.052 seconds, but he along with Cedric Sbirrazzuoli and Daniel Mancinelli will still line up on the front row for Ferrari.
Rovera, Charlie Scardina, and Triarsi Competizione manager/namesake Onofrio Triarsi Jnr will start from third in their red and white #23 Ferrari behind them, as Scardina and Triarsi make the step up from the Am to the Pro-Am class.
After them were the two K-PAX Lamborghinis, the green #3 of Pepper, Franck Perera, and Misha Goikhberg followed by the black #1 of two-time GT World Challenge America Champion Andrea Caldarelli, with co-drivers Marco Mapelli, and Michele Beretta.
Robby Foley put the #96 Turner Motorsport M4 sixth on the grid, the car he’ll share with Michael Dinan and John Edwards.
In seventh was Mario Farnbacher in the #93 Racers Edge Motorsports Acura NSX GT3. Farnbacher, Ashton Harrison, and Christina Nielsen were the only one of the four GTWCA Pro-Am Championship contending teams that ultimately made the shootout, with Harrison bidding to become the first woman to win a GT World Challenge America series championship alongside her regular co-driver Farnbacher.
Ryan Dalziel was eighth in the #13 Triarsi Competizione Ferrari (with Justin Wetherill and Conrad Grunewald), followed by Jeff Westphal in the 2018-spec #218 Andretti Autosport/Vital Sport Ferrari (with Ryan Briscoe and Jarett Andretti) in ninth, and finally, Nick Wittmer in tenth aboard the #38 ST Racing M4 (with Samantha Tan and Harry Gottsacker).
Feature image © SRO Motorsports Group, Mercedes-AMG Motorsport