Result: Night Practice
Sheldon van der Linde set the pace in Night Practice at Kyalami this evening after heavy rain prevented anyone else from matching BMW Team Schnitzer’s home favourite.
The South African, who grew up only 10 minutes from the track, recorded his best of 1m42.942s one-third of the way through the 90-minute session just before heavy rain began to fall. That was enough to beat Chris Mies’ Land Motorsport Audi by 0.181s and lead a top-10 covered by under one second.
Michael Christensen’s GPX Racing Porsche briefly led before Van der Linde set his benchmark time, while Nick Tandy slotted Frikadelli’s 911 into fourth.
Two factory Audis also featured in the top-five courtesy of Sheldon’s older brother, Kelvin, who beat the Dinamic Porsche and Walkenhorst BMW.
The first of KCMG’s Nissans was next in eighth overall while early pace-setter Jordan Pepper slipped to ninth. Lechner Racing’s 911 completed the top-10.
However, one noticeable absentee was championship leader Maxi Buhk whose GruppeM Mercedes-AMG suffered heavy damage during testing earlier today. The team will have just one further session with which to hone set-up ahead of tomorrow afternoon’s qualifying session and Pole Shootout.
Indeed, pre-qualifying starts at 10:50 CAT before the grid for Saturday’s race is set across four 15-minute qualifying sessions. Watch them live on Intercontinental’s website and Facebook page, SRO’s GT World Youtube channel, and SuperSports TV in South Africa.