Alex Lynn secured Cadillac's first-ever pole position at the Le Mans 24 Hours in final qualifying for the 2025 edition.
Lynn in the #12 Jota-run Cadillac he shares with Norman Nato and Will Steves, headed the sister #38 car, driven by Earl Bamber in qualifying, as the Cadillacs demoted the Penske Porsches from the front row at the final moment.
Fifteen Hypercar entries contested the Thursday evening Hyperpole, with the list of contenders whittled down to 10 entries after the opening of the two segments (Hyperpole 1 and Hyperpole 2) - and with a driver change mandated between them for those who advanced.
The #5 Porsche led most of Hyperpole 2 after Mathieu Jaminet's initial effort, but had to settle for third in the end - though the team will still be pleased with that outcome given the car was very nearly out of the top 10.
(Image courtesy of David Addison)
The car lost its rear right wheel in crucial moments of Hyperpole 1, but the early laptime Julien Andlauer had set proved just good enough despite rival cars getting progressively quicker.
Dries Vanthoor put the leading WRT BMW, the #15, in fourth place, ahead of the #4 Porsche that Nick Tandy drove in the pole shoot-out.
The last driver within a second of the 1m23.166s pole time in Hyperpole 2 (which was slower than the Hyperpole 1-topping time) was BMW's Sheldon van der Linde, sixth in the #20.
Ferrari hardly lived up to its pre-race billing as the overwhelming pre-race favourite, with Antonio Fuoco its lead driver in the #50 in seventh.
Felipe Drugovich in the #311 Cadillac and Fred Makowiecki in the #6 Alpine took eighth and ninth respectively
Toyota's bid for pole with its sole car in the pole shootout, the #8, collapsed when Sebastien Buemi suffered a puncture that was either induced by or was the cause of a trip into the gravel at Mulsanne, with the car slowly crawling back into the pits and finishing 10th with no laptime.
The 2023 Le Mans 24 Hours-winning #51 Ferrari was the big surprise absentee from the pole shootout, with Alessandro Pier Guidi a tenth off advancing into Hyperpole 2.
Also a tenth off was 12th-placed Paul-Loup Chatin in the #35 Alpine, with the #83 AF Corse Ferrari of Ye Yifei, the #101 Cadillac of Ricky Taylor and the #009 Aston Martin of Marco Sorensen - a surprise addition to Hyperpole in the first place following the Wednesday exclusion of the #6 Porsche.
Hypercar qualifying results
1 #12 Cadillac (Stevens/Nato/Lynn)
2 #38 Cadillac (Bamber/Bourdais/Button)
3 #5 Porsche (Andlauer/Christensen/Jaminet)
4 #15 BMW (Vanthoor/Marciello/Magnussen)
5 #4 Porsche (Nasr/Tandy/Wehrlein)
6 #20 BMW (Rast/Frijns/van der Linde)
7 #50 Ferrari (Fuoco/Nielsen/Molina)
8 #311 Cadillac (Vesti/Aitken/Drugovich)
9 #36 Alpine (Schumacher/Gounon/Makowiecki)
10 #8 Toyota (Buemi/Hartley/Hirakawa)
11 #51 Ferrari (Pier Guidi/Giovinazzi/Calado)
12 #35 Alpine (Chatin/Habsburg/Milesi)
13 #83 AF Corse Ferrari (Ye/Hanson/Kubica)
14 #101 Cadillac (Taylor/Taylor/Albuquerque)
15 #009 Aston Martin (Sorensen/Riberas/De Angelis)
16 #7 Toyota (Conway/Kobayashi/De Vries)
17 #94 Peugeot (Duval/Vandoorne/Jakobsen)
18 #93 Peugeot (Jensen/Vergne/Di Resta)
19 #99 Proton Porsche (Varrone/Pino/Jani)
20 #007 Aston Martin (Gunn/Tincknell/Gamble)
21 #6 Porsche (Campbell/Vanthoor/Estre)
LMP2 and LMGT3 pole fights
An electric LMP2 pole battle turned out in favour of 38-year-old Mathias Beche in the #29 TDS Racing Pro/Am entry, which Beche shares with Clement Novalak and Rodrigo Sales (the entry's designated Bronze driver).
Going over a second quicker than he had done in Wednesday qualifying, Beche prevailed in a great scrap against Tom Dillmann (#43 Inter Europol), Louis Deletraz (#199 AO by TF), Ben Hanley (#23 United Autosports) and Pietro Fittipaldi (#22 United Autosports) - the five covered by just 0.553s.
LMP2 qualifying results
1 #29 TDS (Beche/Novalak/Sales)
2 #43 Inter Europol (Dillmann/Yelloly/Smiechowski)
3 #199 AO by TF (Deletraz/Cameron/Hyett)
4 #23 United Autosports (Jarvis/Hanley/Schneider)
5 #22 United Autosports (van der Zande/Fittipaldi/Heinemeier Hansson)
6 #37 CLX Pure (Blomqvist/Vautier/Malykhin)
7 #183 AF Corse (Vaxiviere/Felix da Costa/Perrodo)
8 #16 RLR MSport (Pilet/Jensen/Cullen)
9 #28 Idec Sport (van Uitert/Alvarez/Lafargue)
10 #45 Algarve Pro (Kurtz/Catsburg/Quinn)
11 #48 VDS Panis (Perera/Masson/Gray)
12 #25 Algarve Pro (Pourchaire/Fluxa/Kaiser)
13 #11 Proton Competition (Roda/Binder/Viscaal)
14 #18 Idec Sport (Chadwick/Jaubert/Lotterer)
15 #9 Iron Lynx - Proton Iron Lynx-Proton (Ried/Capietto/De Gerus)
16 #34 Inter Europol (Boulle/Simmenauer/Ghiotto)
17 #24 Nielsen (Rao/Bolukbasi/Braun)
Platinum drivers Mattia Drudi (#27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin) and Alessio Rovera (#21 Vista AF Corse Ferrari) went head to head for the LMGT3 pole, after their entries' Bronze and Silver drivers did the job in Wednesday qualifying and the first LMGT3 Hyperpole segment respectively.
Drudi, who shares the car with Bronze driver Ian James and Silver driver Zacharie Robichon, ultimately prevailed by a quarter of a second.
Though he finished two seconds off, MotoGP legend Valentino Rossi - one of just two Silver drivers in the eight-driver LMGT3 pole shootout because of how driver strategies shook out - caught the eye by snatching third place in what looks like a very potent #46 WRT BMW entry.
"I did the Hyperpole with the pros, so to stay up there I'm very very happy - also I did a very good lap. It's a great way to start," Rossi rejoiced.
GT3 qualifying results
1 #27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin (Drudi/Robichon/James)
2 #21 Vista AF Corse Ferrari (Rovera/Mann/Heriau)
3 #46 WRT BMW (van der Linde/Rossi/Al Harthy)
4 #61 Iron Lynx Mercedes (Martin/Hodenius/Berry)
5 #92 Manthey 1st Phorm Porsche (Lietz/Pera/Hardwick)
6 #81 TF Sport Corvette (Eastwood/Andrade/Martin)
7 #95 United Autosports McLaren (Sato/Gelael/Leung)
8 #78 Akkodis ASP Lexus (Hawksworth/Gehrsitz/Robin)
9 #193 Ziggo Tempesta Ferrari (Cheever/Froggatt/Hui)
10 #88 Proton Ford (Olsen/Levorato/Gattuso)
11 #59 United Autosports McLaren (Saucy/Baud/Cottingham)
12 #54 Vista AF Corse Ferrari (Rigon/Castellacci/Flohr)
13 #77 Proton Ford (Barker/Tuck/Sousa)
14 #87 Akkodis ASP Lexus (Lopez/Schmid/Umbrarescu)
15 #57 Kessel Ferrari (Serra/Stevenson/Kimura)
16 #31 WRT BMW (Farfus/Boguslavskiy/Shahin)
17 #33 TF Sport Corvette (Juncadella/Edgar/Keating)
18 #10 Racing Spirit of LeMan Aston Martin (Hasse-Clot/Barrichello/DeBoer)
19 #85 Iron Dames Porsche (Frey/Martin/Bovy)
20 #90 Manthey Porsche (Bachler/Hartog/Au)
21 #13 AWA Corvette (Bell/Kern/Fidani)
22 #60 Iron Lynx Mercedes (Rueda/Hanafin/Gilbert)
23 #63 Iron Lynx Mercedes (Stolz/Grove/Grove)
24 #150 Richard Mille AF Corse Ferrari (Agostini/Wadoux/Toledo)
