GT: Buhk claims Monza Blancpain pole

HTP Mercedes driver Maximilian Buhk claimed pole position for the opening round of the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup at Monza.

The German jumped to the top spot aboard his Mercedes-AMG GT3 in the closing stages of the final 15-minute qualifying session with a 1m47.509s. That gave him the pole by just 0.016s from the RJN Motorsport Nissan GT-R NISMO GT3 driven by Alex Buncombe.

"Pole is always good and we weren't expecting it today," Buhk said. "Pole means we can hopefully stay out of trouble at the first corner and for the first few laps."

Buncombe's second-placed Nissan was in turn just 0.067s ahead of Giancarlo Fisichella, who took the pro-am class pole aboard his AF Corse Ferrari 488 GT3. Matteo Malucelli claimed fourth, and second in pro-am, for the Scuderia Praha Ferrari squad. Clemens Schmid lined up fifth in his HTP Merc, ahead of Andy Soucek in the best of the M-Sport Bentley Continental GT3s.

The top 20 cars were within half a second around the 3.60-mile Monza circuit and the first 31 within a second.

Originally on Autosport.com