Carrera Cup Italia | Vallelunga: Klein sets the pace in free practice

The fifth and penultimate round of the Porsche Carrera Cup Italia at the Vallelunga Circuit opened with a Marvin Klein signature on Friday’s free practice. In view of tomorrow morning’s qualifying, the two-time French champion of Target Competition made a great start to the chase for Larry Ten Voorde, to whom he still has 11 points in the general classification, and placed a time of 1’34″229 right on the checkered flag of the scheduled time for the round.

As in yesterday’s test, when Janne Stiak was the fastest in 1’33″977, the South Tyrolean team appeared to be particularly on top form, with the 17-year-old German rookie also comfortably entering the top five thanks to his fourth fastest time, 3 tenths behind the “captain”.

Immediately behind him, however, a lively (despite the flu of the past few days) Francesco Braschi made his mark. The 19-year-old from Cattolica of Dinamic Motorsport was in the lead until the final exploit of the Frenchman and then concluded with the second best lap just one tenth from Klein, following the last minutes from the box together with team manager Gianni Morbidelli.

In addition to Target, Ombra Racing also placed two cars in the top five today, thanks to the third time of Lirim Zendeli just 40 hundredths behind Braschi, with whom he is fighting for the new Rookie title, and the fifth of the British Oliver Gray, who finished 3 tenths behind Klein at the same level as Stiak.

So there is a lot of Scholarship Programme up front, while the second half of the top-10 hosts several “senators”. Among these, Diego Bertonelli did well, sixth with TDE at half a second and in the lead for a few minutes halfway through the session. At 5 tenths there is also Keagan Masters, seventh with Team Q8 Hi Perform and therefore also him, another rival for the title, well ahead of Ten Voorde, who at the wheel of the 911 GT3 Cup of Fulgenzi Racing obtained only the 15th time at over a second from Klein, dragging along his young teammate Flynt Schuring for the entire session.

finishing in the top 10, eighth place today was taken by Simone Iaquinta, 6 tenths behind Ghinzani, while 9 tenths behind are home driver Flavio Olivieri, the surprising Roman rookie from Raptor Engineering, and the two BeDriver standard-bearers Alberto Cerqui and Bayley Hall, the Australian who finished 11th behind his teammate from Brescia.

In the Michelin Cup, Cesare Brusa continues the excellent trend started with his first success in Imola with the best time in the category, 1’35″666 set with Prima Ghinzani’s 911 GT3 Cup.

The Ebimotors duo formed by Paolo Gnemmi and Alberto De Amicis are a good 4 tenths behind, who in turn are just ahead of their title rival Francesco Fenici, fourth with Raptro Engineering, while Stefano Stefanelli (Team Malucelli) and Alex De Giacomi (Tsunami RT) are slightly further behind.

Two Full Course Yellows were used during the free practice sessions, the first, a few minutes after the green lights, for an exit into the gravel by Oliver Gragor at the Semaforo curve, the second shortly before the end for another exit at the Semaforo, again without particular consequences, that of Marco Galassi,

Now the weekend has its highlight in store, with a crucial qualifying session scheduled for tomorrow (Saturday) morning at 9.45, followed in the afternoon by a crucial race 1 for the title chase scheduled for 16.40 with live coverage on Dazn (also in free mode) and live streaming on www.carreracupitalia.it always in high definition.

The times of free practice