Mark and his team mates take fifth pole of the season in Bahrain

Porsche Team: Brendon Hartley, Mark Webber, Timo Bernhard (l-r)

In all eight rounds of the FIA World Endurance Championship no car other than a Porsche 919 Hybrid has made it onto the front row. At each race the Porsche Team has taken pole position and the second spot on the grid. At the finale in Bahrain Timo Bernhard (DE), Brendon Hartley (NZ) and Mark Webber (AUS) took their fifth pole position of the year. Thanks to an advantage of what is now a 13 point lead, a fourth place finish in Saturday’s six-hour race would earn them the World Championship’s drivers’ title. The sister car of Romain Dumas (FR), Neel Jani (CH) and Marc Lieb (DE) has taken pole position three times this year and will start from P2 in the Kingdom of Bahrain.

In the WEC the average of the best laps of two drivers counts for the grid position. In Bahrain Bernhard/Hartley (car number 17) and Dumas/Lieb (car number 18) were the qualifying drivers. In cooler temperatures in the dark, Bernhard managed to set a new record for prototypes on the 5.412 kilometre long Grand Prix circuit by lapping in 1:39.670 minutes. The average lap time for the number 17 car was 1:39.736 minutes, while the average lap time for their number 18 team mates’ was 1:40.100 minutes.

In the morning, during the third free practice session, the Porsche prototypes, from the team that won the Manufacturers’ World Championship at the penultimate round, were first and second in the same order. The fastest lap times were 1:40.917 minutes and 1:42.070 minutes.

The eighth and final round will start on Saturday at 15:00 hrs local time (13:00 hrs CET). The TV channel Eurosport will broadcast the final hour and the podium ceremony live. Live feed, timing and more is available at the FIA WEC App. Live features such as on-board cameras, timing and GPS tracking are also available in the Porsche Motorsport App (free of charge).

1 Comment

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  Petra

  on November 20, 2015 Reply

  Mark this is simply brilliant, congrats to you and the team! Good luck ! This time you gone make it! Big hug from Germany!