BARCELONA (9 September, 2022) – Herberth Motorsport has taken pole position for the 23rd running of the Hankook 24H BARCELONA ahead of a charging WTM Racing. 

The Herberth Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R (#91, Daniel Allemann / Ralf Bohn / Alfred Renauer / Robert Renauer / Jürgen Häring) set the benchmark early, Ralf Bohn pulling half a second clear of the GT field with a 1m 49.388s in Q1. Similarly strong runs from brothers – and team principals – Alfred and Robert Renauer meant the Herberth Motorsport netted an average time of 1m 49.316s around the 4.675km Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, thus securing pole position nine-tenths clear. 

This marks the second year in a row that Herberth Motorsport has taken pole position for the Hankook 24H BARCELONA. 

The WTM Racing Ferrari 488 GT3 meanwhile (#22, Georg Weiss / Leonard Weiss / Nicolas Varrone / Daniel Keilwitz / Indy Dontje), which was 19th on the timesheets in Q1, made an extraordinary comeback to secure a front row start, posting the fastest laps in Q2 and Q3 in the process. Nicolas Varrone’s 1m 47.971s was the quickest lap of the afternoon.

“It’s nice to be on pole for the second time in a row,” Robert Renauer explained to radiolemans.com’s Andrew Marriott. “But honestly the Ferrari looks really good. They set a really good lap in their second [session], so it’s going to be an interesting race for us. We’ll cross our fingers!” 

After a six-year hiatus from the 24H SERIES, Poulsen Motorsport (#14, Roland Poulsen / Kristian Poulsen / Christoffer Nygaard / Alfred Nilsson) will start an impressive 3rd overall with its brand-new BMW M4 GT3 having bested the Mercedes-AMG GT3 of GT3-AM polesitter CP Racing (#85, Charles Putman / Charles Espenlaub / Joe Foster / Shane Lewis) by just 0.011s.

Reigning Overall GT Teams’ champion ST Racing (#1, Samantha Tan / Nick Wittmer / Bryson Morris / Steven Aghakhani), which makes its first 24H SERIES start since winning outright in Mugello in March, looked on course for a front row start with its BMW M4 GT3, but eventually slipped back to 5th in Q3. 

The Huber Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R (#23, Jörg Dreisow / Alexander Schwarzer / Manuel Lauck / Wolfgang Triller / Marc Basseng) will start 6th overall – ahead of the returning Hofor Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 (#11, Michael Kroll / Chantal Prinz / Alexander Prinz / Max Partl / Thomas Mühlenz) and the JUTA Racing Audi R8 LMS GT3 (#71, Eimantas Navikauskas / Aurimas Jablonskis / Paul August / Lars Viljoen / Jonas Gelžinis) – having held the position across all three qualifying sessions. 

Remarkably, the Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II of GT3 standings leader Phoenix Racing (#18, Michael Doppelmayr / Pierre Kaffer / Elia Erhart / Swen Herberger) will line up 9th on the grid after a quiet run.

Vortex V8 (#701, Arnaud Gomez / Olivier Gomez / Lucas Lasserre) will lead the GTX field away ahead of the Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeos of championship rivals RD Signs RD Signs – Siauliai racing team (#720, Audrius Butkevicius / Nicola Michelon / Paulius Paskevicius / Arturs Batraks / Alfredo Hernandez) and Leipert Motorsport (#710, Kerong Li / Jean-Francois Brunot / Gerhard Watzinger / Gregg Gorski / Brendon Leitch). 

Less than one-tenth split 992 class polesitter Red Camel-Jordans.nl (#909, Ivo Breukers / Luc Breukers / Rik Breukers / Fabian Danz) and nearest championship rival Red Ant Racing (#903, Ayrton Redant / Bert Redant / Yannick Redant / Sam Dejonghe), while further back, Red Ant’s sister Porsche GT3 Cup (#904, Wim Spinoy / Kobe de Breucker / Jimmy de Breucker / Arnold Neveling) pipped Spain’s Baporo Racing (#951, Manel Lao Cornago / Jaume Font / Daniel Diaz Varela / Guillem Pujeu) by a similarly small margin for 992-AM pole position. 

The returning Willi Motorsport by Ebimotors (#955, Fabrizio Broggi / Sergiu Nicolae / Sabino de Castro) secured 991 pole ahead of Spain’s E2P Racing (#910, Pablo Burguera / Manuel Cintrano / Jaime Garcia / Antonio Sainero / Javier Morcillo), while the Czech Republic’s Senkyr Motorsport BMW M4 GT4 (#444, Samuel Vetrak / Marian Biz / Petr Svantner / Ladislav Smucr / Richard Gonda) took GT4 pole ahead of South Korea’s AtlasBX Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT4 (#403, Steven Cho / Roelof Bruins / Jong Kyum Kim / Taekeun Yang / HA Tae Young).

Following this evening’s official Night Practice, the green flag will fly for the 2022 Hankook 24H BARCELONA at 13.00 hrs local time on Saturday 10 September. The event will run uninterrupted throughout the night until the chequered flag flies at 13.00 hrs local time on Sunday 11 September. The action will be live with commentary from radiolemans.com on the official 24H SERIES YouTube channel. Regular updates will also be published on Twitter (@24HSeries), Facebook (24H Series) and Instagram (24H Series). Further information can be found HERE.