A thousand miles of Sebring, Ferrari on pole: the first blaze of Fire
Fifty years later, Ferrari is on time for the appointment. On its return to the premier class of the Endurance world championship, which also includes the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the 499P number 50 set the reference time among the Hypercars. At the Sebring International Raceway in Florida, the Scuderia from Maranello has entered a new era. Antonio Fuoco stopped the clock with a time of 1'45''067, beating the number 8 Toyota by 0.214 seconds, while Alessandro Pier Guidi in the number 51 Ferrari completed the day with a fourth place.
Thus Ferrari signs a historic pole at the 1000 Miglia di Sebring, the inaugural act of the 2023 FIA WEC championship. The race starts today, Friday 17, at 5 pm (superstitious time). thanks to the on-board cameras of Hypercar number 50 and 51, available in streaming on the Ferrari.com website and on the official Ferrari YouTube channel.
Together with the Italian Fuoco, the Spaniard Miguel Molina and the Dane Nicklas Nielsen will take turns driving, while in the team with Guidi there will be the Englishman James Calado and the former Formula 1 driver Antonio Giovinazzi.
The last Ferrari to start from the front on the grid in the premier class was the 312 PB of Arturo Merzario and Carlos Pace at the 1973 24 Hours of Le Mans.
At Sebring the others are far away because the number 2 Cadillac finishes fifth with Alex Lynn, 1" full from the leader and with the two Porsche 963s of Kévin Estre (with number 6) and Michael Christensen (5) behind, both 2" behind . The Peugeots are bad, with the 9X8 n. Loic Duval's No. 94 is eighth at 2"3, ahead of Mikkel Jensen's No. 93, ninth at 3"1. At the end of the group the Glickenhaus n. 708 by Olivier Pla and the Vanwall no. 4 by Tom Dillmann, both more than 4" from the pole position by Fuoco.
"There are not many occasions in which a result can be defined as historic, but this time I think we can use this adjective - rejoices Antonello Coletta, head of Ferrari's GT activities -. The road is very long, the race will be very difficult, but today we want to celebrate this extraordinary performance in qualifying because it pays off for the great sacrifices that the team, the riders and the whole work group have made in these very intense months".
