Marvin Dienst was fastest in an interrupted Free Practice session at Misano. The #54 Dinamic GT Porsche set a 1m31.870s in the second half of proceedings following a lengthy stoppage.
Indeed, this was not the simplest start to the weekend. The session was half an hour old when Tom Fleming crashed the #71 AF Corse Ferrari heavily at Turn 4. The damage to the barriers was significant, requiring an interruption of more than 45 minutes.
The green flag flew at 10:20, which should have left only 20 minutes before the chequered flag. However a new timetable allowed for 15 minutes of Bronze and Silver running, followed by another hour with the full field on-track.
Lucas Légeret led the opening segment in the #111 CSA Racing Audi. When the Platinum and Gold drivers joined in the times tumbled further, Dries Vanthoor establishing a new benchmark of 1m31.908s at the wheel of the #32 Team WRT BMW. This was subsequently beaten by Dienst in the #54 Dinamic GT Porsche, who edged the seven-time Misano winner by 0.038s. Dienst also topped the Bronze Cup alongside team-mate Philipp Sager.
The #9 Boutsen VDS Mercedes-AMG was third fastest in the hands of Jules Gounon. Fourth overall and best of the Gold Cup runners was Gilles Magnus, who set a 1m32.066s at the controls of the #25 Saintéloc Racing Audi. He was followed by two more R8 runners: the #99 Tresor Attempto Racing and the #111 CSA Racing.
The best of the Silver Cup runners was the #15 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG. Reece Barr set a 1m32.465s to place 15th overall. All 35 cars entered in this weekend's event participated in the session, with the #71 Ferrari ultimately classified last following its early exit.
Cars will be back on-track at 15:50 for a one-hour Pre-Qualifying session. Later today, Qualifying takes place under the lights at 21:10 and signals the start of live streaming on GT World.
The main action all takes place tomorrow: Race 1 gets underway at 14:00, followed by Race 2 at 21:00. The latter is set to be the first Fanatec GT Europe Sprint Cup contest staged in darkness since 2021.
> Result: Free Practice