Mercedes-AMG Team Verstappen Racing bagged its first-ever ROWE Pole Position Award as Jules Gounon surged to P1 in this morning's qualifying session at Misano.
Gounon's time of 1m32.017s was made all the more impressive by the fact that the #3 Mercedes-AMG was damaged by the opening lap accident in last night's race, requiring repairs that continued well into the night. This was Gounon's first Sprint Cup pole in two years and the first for AMG since Brands Hatch in 2025.
Gounon knocked last night's winner off top spot, with Kelvin van der Linde taking second on the grid in the #32 Team WRT BMW. The car was placed under investigation for an unsafe release, but was handed a fine rather than a grid penalty.
Kobe Pauwels produced a stellar lap to qualify P3 in the #7 Comtoyou Racing Aston Martin, by far the car's best result of the season in Sprint. Max Hesse took fourth in the #46 Team WRT BMW, followed by Arthur Leclerc (#50 AF Corse Ferrari) and Maro Engel (#48 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG).
Arthur Rougier qualified seventh overall in the #111 CSA Racing McLaren to earn Gold Cup pole, four spots ahead of yesterday's victories Audi. Aurélien Panis bagged Silver Cup pole by qualifying 14th overall in the #6 GetSpeed Team Bartone Bros Mercedes-AMG.
Bronze Cup pole went to Charles Dawson, whose 1m33.181s lap was barely a second shy of Gounon's benchmark and came in the first part of qualifying. Dawson will start 25th overall, four spots ahead of his closest class contender.
The biggest shock of qualifying was the championship-leading #80 Lionspeed GP Porsche, which could only manage 13th on the grid with Bastian Buus at the wheel. All of its title rivals qualified among the top six and will look to seize the advantage this afternoon. The weekend's second race gets underway at 14:30 CEST and can be watched live on the GT World YouTube channel.
> Provisional Result: Misano Q2