The 32 cars that will participate in tomorrow's Superpole session were decided on Thursday evening, while pole-sitters for the 78th CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa have already been confirmed in two of the five classes.
The #17 Mercedes-AMG Team GetSpeed squad was fastest of all with its trio of Martin/Götz/Schiller, who edged the #51 AF Corse Ferrari of Rovera/Mosca/Nielsen by 0.019s on average times. Both paced a session, with Rovera leading Q1 and Schiller on top in Q4.
Porsche teams were third and fourth quickest with the #80 Lionspeed GP ahead of the #2 Boutsen VDS. The #50 AF Corse Ferrari was fifth, followed by the #48 Mercedes-AMG Team Mann-Filter, the #59 Garage 59 McLaren, the #3 Mercedes-AMG Team Verstappen Racing, and the #7 Comtoyou Racing Aston Martin.
Each of the 18 Pro cars has reached Superpole. All but one of the Gold Cup runners also progressed, the exception being the #24 Steller Motorsport Corvette. The qualifiers will be joined by six Silver Cup cars, which will battle for their class pole tomorrow afternoon. The fastest of them was the #5 Optimum Motorsport McLaren in P16 overall.
Bronze Cup pole has been decided in favour of the defending winner, Kessel Racing, which was the only car from its class to qualify for Superpole. The #74 Ferrari of Blattner/Marschall/Jaubert/Tuck was 30th of the 69 cars and will thus be unopposed tomorrow. Its closest rival, the #87 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG, qualified 36th overall.
The #700 Comtoyou Racing Aston Martin initially appeared to have taken Pro-Am pole with its all-Belgian line-up, but a penalty dropped the car down the order. This elevated the #86 High Class Racing Porsche to the head of its class with the crew of Li/Yuan/Ye/Fjordbach.
The early part of the session was punctuated by a handful of red flags, all for relatively minor incidents. Also of note, Simon Gachet set the fastest individual time in qualifying with a 2m16.685s in Q3, helping the #111 CSA Racing McLaren to comfortably reach Superpole.
The deciding session will get underway at 15:05 on Friday. All 32 cars will contest the opening 10 minutes, after which the 16 slowest will be eliminated and their grid positions locked in. The remaining drivers will compete in a seven-minute session in which eight cars will be eliminated, then another seven minutes to determine the final four.
Superpole will be settled by each completing a single flying lap of the 7km Spa-Francorchamps circuit. The session will be streamed live with a variety of commentary options on the GT World YouTube channel.