Nurburgring WEC: Bernhard tops opening practice for Porsche

Timo Bernhard set a 1m41.612s in the #2 Porsche 919 Hybrid with 20 minutes to go in the opening practice session for Sunday's fourth round of the FIA World Endurance Championship.

That put the Porsche a shade over two tenths up on the best of the Toyota TS050 Hybrids in which Sebastien Buemi posted a 1m41.816s right at the start of the 90-minute session.

Neel Jani was less than a tenth behind in the second Porsche on a 1m41.896s, while Mike Conway took fourth in the final Toyota on 1m41.979s.

Porsche is running its high-downforce 919 for the first time after opting to field its cars with aerodynamics developed for the Le Mans 24 Hours at the Silverstone and Spa WEC rounds in April and May respectively.

Bruno Senna led the way in LMP2 for the Rebellion team, posting an early class best of 1m47.717s in his #31 Oreca.

No one was able to get within half a second of his time, Pierre Thiriet ending up more than six tenths back on a 1m48.379s aboard the #26 G-Drive Oreca.

Davide Rigon headed the practice times in GTE Pro for Ferrari.

His 1m57.170s aboard the #71 AF Corse-run Ferrari 488 GTE put him ahead of second-placed Kevin Estre, who recorded a 1m57.307s in the best of the factory Porsche 911 RSRs.

Alessandro Pier Guidi was third fastest in the second of the two AF factory cars with a 1m57.483s.

The fastest of the Ganassi Ford GTs, which have received a 20g penalty for this race under the new automatic Balance of Performance system, took fourth in Olivier Pla's hands.

The two Aston Martin Vantages brought up the rear of the GTE Pro field despite receive a weight break and a getting a larger-diameter engine air-restrictor for this race.

Matteo Cairoli was fastest in GTE Am for the Dempsey Proton Porsche squad.

Practice results:

Cla	#	Drivers	Car	Class	Time	Gap
1	2	Timo Bernhard Brendon Hartley Earl Bamber	Porsche 919 Hybrid	LMP1	1'41.612
2	8	Anthony Davidson Kazuki Nakajima Sébastien Buemi	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	1'41.816	0.204
3	1	Andre Lotterer Neel Jani Nick Tandy	Porsche 919 Hybrid	LMP1	1'41.896	0.284
4	7	Kamui Kobayashi Mike Conway Jose Maria Lopez	Toyota TS050 Hybrid	LMP1	1'41.979	0.367
5	31	Bruno Senna Julien Canal Filipe Albuquerque	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'47.717	6.105
6	26	Roman Rusinov Pierre Thiriet Ben Hanley	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'48.379	6.767
7	28	François Perrodo Emmanuel Collard Matthieu Vaxivière	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'48.401	6.789
8	38	Oliver Jarvis Ho-Pin Tung Thomas Laurent	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'48.501	6.889
9	25	Vitaly Petrov Simon Trummer Roberto Gonzalez	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'48.809	7.197
10	36	Nicolas Lapierre Gustavo Menezes Matt Rao	Alpine A470	LMP2	1'48.987	7.375
11	4	Marco Bonanomi Oliver Webb Dominik Kraihamer	ENSO CLM P1/01	LMP1	1'49.012	7.400
12	13	Pipo Derani David Heinemeier Hansson Mathias Beche	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'49.096	7.484
13	37	David Cheng Tristan Gommendy Alex Brundle	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'49.168	7.556
14	35	Nelson Panciatici Pierre Ragues Andre Negrao	Alpine A470	LMP2	1'49.486	7.874
15	24	Roberto Merhi Jonathan Hirschi Tor Graves	Oreca 07	LMP2	1'50.166	8.554
16	34	Nigel Moore Philip Hanson	Ligier JS P217	LMP2	1'51.644	10.032
17	71	Toni Vilander Davide Rigon	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE PRO	1'57.170	15.558
18	92	Michael Christensen Kevin Estre	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	1'57.307	15.695
19	51	James Calado Alessandro Pier Guidi	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE PRO	1'57.483	15.871
20	66	Stefan Mücke Olivier Pla	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	1'57.618	16.006
21	91	Richard Lietz Frédéric Makowiecki	Porsche 911 RSR	LMGTE PRO	1'57.632	16.020
22	67	Harry Tincknell Andy Priaulx	Ford GT	LMGTE PRO	1'57.939	16.327
23	95	Marco Sorensen Nicki Thiim	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE PRO	1'57.993	16.381
24	97	Darren Turner Jonathan Adam Daniel Serra	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE PRO	1'58.224	16.612
25	77	Christian Ried Matteo Cairoli Marvin Dienst	Porsche 911 RSR (991)	LMGTE AM	1'59.208	17.596
26	54	Francesco Castellacci Miguel Molina Thomas Flohr	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	1'59.346	17.734
27	86	Michael Wainwright Ben Barker Nick Foster Jr.	Porsche 911 RSR (991)	LMGTE AM	1'59.370	17.758
28	98	Pedro Lamy Paul Dalla Lana Mathias Lauda	Aston Martin Vantage	LMGTE AM	1'59.456	17.844
29	61	Matt Griffin Mok Weng Sun Keita Sawa	Ferrari 488 GTE	LMGTE AM	1'59.728	18.116