During the third and final free practice session Saturday morning, Rebellion Racing's two R13s dominated the two Toyota TS050 Hybrids, but the Japanese marque was able to claim the top two spots on the starting grid during qualifying with André Lotterer (three-time 24 Hours of Le Mans winner with Audi) clocking the second fastest time (1:42.869) behind Kamui Kobayashi (1:42.708).

Lotterer and Bruno Senna's performances forced Rebellion Racing's #1 R13 to third position on the starting grid (by averaging the fastest times of each of the two drivers tasked with qualifying) just trailing - by less than three-tenths of a second - the #8 Toyota TS050 Hybrid shared by Sébastien Buemi, Fernando Alonso and Kazuki Nakajima (winner of the 2018 24 Hours of Le Mans). Mike Conway and Kamui Kobayashi secured pole position with a time of 1:42.931 while Jenson Button and his teammates had to settle for seventh position.

With a one-two in LMP1, the LMP2 class followed suit with Jackie Chan DC Racing's "Mighty38" ORECA 07 driven by Ho-Pin Tung (class winner at Le Mans in 2017), Gabriel Aubry and Stéphane Richelmi (1:48.888) beating out the "FortuneCat37" sister car by less than three-tenths of a second. DragonSpeed's ORECA 07 rounded out the French constructor's dominance with fourth position for the Alpine A470, despite Nicolas Lapierre's fastest time (1:48.598), as the car's chassis is an ORECA.

Though the track records set last year remained intact in the prototype class, the GT drivers did not disappoint in LMGTE Pro and LMGTE Am. In LMGTE Pro, the 2017 record established by Michael Christensen (1:59.578) with the Porsche 911 RSR was crushed by more than a second by Nicky Catsburg (1:58.441) at the wheel of the #81 BMW M8 GT. However, the Dutch driver and his teammate Martin Tomczyk will start from second position on the grid, outdone in the final seconds by Stefan Mücke at the wheel of the #66 Ford GT (1:58.627 in cumulative time). As is often the case in this class, it's a tight race already with all competitors qualifying within the same second, except the Corvette C7.R.

Lastly, though Aston Martin Racing was unable to place better than third position in LMGTE Pro, the British team did score the pole in LMGTE Am thanks to Pedro Lamy and Paul Dalla Lana (2:01.884) with the #98 Vantage, trailed by Dempsey-Proton Racing's #77 Porsche 911 RSR (winner at the 24 Hours this year) and the German manufacturer's #88 sister car despite the record set by Matteo Cairoli in 2:00.128.

The start at the 6 Hours of Shanghai will be given tomorrow, Sunday 18 November at 11:00 local time with a weather forecast calling for rain.

Results

 

PHOTO (Copyright - João Filipe/AdrenalMedia.com - FIA WEC): The Rebellion R13 dominated the third free practice at the 6 Hours of Shanghai before securing third position on the official starting grid.