8 Hours of Bahrain – Free Practice 3: A hierarchy favorable to French women
The last free practice session presented a new hierarchy: on Friday morning, car #93 and car #94 were only separated by Ferrari #83, while the two Alpines are in the Top 6.
Beware of relying too much on the classification at the top of the Hypercar class: with a time of 1:49.443, the Peugeot No. 93 set the best time in an FP3 session more focused on race pace than performance. However, seeing the Peugeots up there is still satisfying.
Especially since car No. 94 was in 4th place, just ahead of the Alpine cars No. 36 and No. 35. The French clean sweep in free practice was prevented by the private Ferrari No. 83 and the no less unexpected Lamborghini No. 63.
On the side of the title contenders, the first car in the running, the Ferrari No. 50, completed its session in the garage: despite a 7th time, the victorious car at Le Mans this year was affected by an issue with the electric motor.
Porsche No. 6, just a few points away from the titles, only finished 12th, while Toyota No. 7 was just ahead, in 11th place.
In LMGT3, the Manthey Pure Racing’s Porsche No. 92 took the lead, to celebrate its title in a good way. The Akkodis No. 78 follows in an encouraging 2nd place, ahead of the Vista AF Corse’s Ferrari No. 55. The Iron Dames finished in a distant 16th place, once again as performance was not the goal.
The qualifying session will start at 2 p.m. with the LMGT3, followed by the Hypercars.
The classification of the third free practice session is coming soon.
