By alley - May 10, 2015, 8:31 AM ET

Blancpain GT: Frijns/Vanthoor win Brands Hatch opener

Laurens Vanthoor and Robin Frijns dominated the Brands Hatch Blancpain Sprint Series qualifying race on the way to a 26-second victory aboard their WRT Audi.

Vanthoor converted pole position into the lead of the race and was able to ease his Audi R8 LMS ultra away from the Reiter Lamborghini driven by Nicky Catsburg.

The Audi was seven seconds up on the Lamborghini Gallardo LP560 when Vanthoor stopped to hand over to Frijns, who was more than 11s ahead after the pit stop sequence was complete.

Frijns had extended that advantage to 23s over Albert von Thurn und Taxi when the Lamborghini was forced to take a penalty for speeding in the pitlane, and was then able to cruise over the remainder of the one-hour race.

"The car has good pace and Robin did a great job, especially considering that he doesn't really know the circuit yet," Vanthoor said. "But the important thing is the main race this afternoon."

The penalty for the Lamborghini promoted the second WRT Audi driven by Christopher Mies and Enzo Ide to second before

they, too, were penalized post-race

. Mies had run third to Catsburg in the opening stint, while Ide had to fend off a late challenge from Atila Abreu in the best of the BMW Team Brazil entries.

The BMW Z4, which was started by Valdeno Brito, was in turn under pressure from the MRS Nissan GT-R NISMO driven by Sean Walkinshaw. Craig Dolby had run fourth in the Nissan through the opening half hour before the car dropped to sixth during the pit stop sequence.

Walkinshaw managed to pass Caca Bueno in the second Brazilian BMW for fifth with 11 laps to go and then moved up a further place with the Lamborgini's penalty.

The second BMW, which was started by Sergio Jimenez, ended up fifth just ahead of the lead Attempto McLaren 650S driven by Rob Bell and Kevin Estre.

Estre was able to pass Niki Mayr-Melnhof in the Phoenix Audi behind which Bell had been stuck through the opening stint and close down a six-second deficit to the the BMW.

HTP Bentley drivers Jules Szymkowiak and Olivier Lombard took Silver Cup honors with 13th overall.

DTM legend Bernd Schnedier and Alexey Karachev claimed victory in the Pro-Am class for the GT Russian Team even though their Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG lost power at the end.

Originally on Autosport.com