Team China Porsche on pole for FIA GT1 Zolder

Posted: 21 Apr 2012 03:46 AM PDT

Team China Porsche on pole for FIA GT1 Zolder

With the weather conditions changing and the track drying, Exim Bank Team China Porsche made the perfect move to slicks for the final qualifying session. Compared to Nagaro, Zolder has been good to the 911 GT3 R and suits its character white well. In Q1 the team was 5th, Q2 saw them 7th and the gamble paid off with a pole in Q3. Mike Parisy nailed some fast laps with a final 1:33.568 landing them on pole.

"The Porsche has been quite quick here, and the track suits us a little bit more than at the last circuit at Nogaro," Halliday said. "Mike did a good job to get us through the early stages. The conditions made it pretty difficult to make the calls on tires, and we had to be on our toes. You don't get a lot of time to make decisions but I think we made the right calls on the set-up and the tires and we just drove it like hell.”

no9 Exim Bank Team China Porsche 997 GT3 R - Mike Parisy / Matt Halliday on Zolder pole

"Everyone in the team helped make the decision, we all just decided at the last minute. It was a bit of a gamble. Sometimes you can take a gamble and it will go the wrong way but today it was definitely the right choice."

Parisy said victory in this afternoon's Qualifying Race was definitely on the cards. "Yes, we can be confident going into the race," the Frenchman said. "A lot depends on the weather of course but we know the car is quick around this circuit and we are ready to win."

The no8 Porsche 911 GT3 R sister car driven by Benjamin Lariche and Ren Wei was on the bubble in Q2 but ended up 14th in the end.

Youtube: Live streaming and our feature series GT1-LIFE will be available on the GT World Youtube channel. http://www.youtube.com/gt1world Live .timing is also available right here on GT1World.com.

The Qualifying Race is LIVE at 13:45 local (GMT +2) today.