Taking over the #51 Ferrari 499P Le Mans Hypercar that Alessandro Pier Guidi drove to second in Hyperpole, Calado whisked to a time of 3m27.275s shortly before Jean-Eric Vergne’s #93 Peugeot 9X8 LMH brought out the red flags when it stopped between the two Mulsanne Chicanes.
The one-hour session was restarted with 20 minutes still on the clock, but there were few noteworthy improvements thereafter as Calado’s benchmark time held.
Calado was 1.003s faster than Esteban Gutierrez in the Le Mans-only #709 Glickenhaus-Pipo 007 that will start the World Endurance Championship blue ribband from 14th.
Gutierrez was in turn 0.162s faster than the Jota Porsche 963 LMDh campaigned by Will Stevens, which missed qualifying on Wednesday due to an electronic problem.
Kevin Estre improved to fourth after the red flag in the best of the factory Penske-run Porsches, his #6 machine usurping the Action Express Racing Cadillac V-Series.R of Alexander Sims.
Jose Maria Lopez completed the top six in the leading Toyota GR010 HYBRID, 1.648s down on Calado, while a late effort from polesitter Antonio Fuoco in the second Ferrari secured him seventh in the #50 machine that didn’t set a time prior to the stoppage.
Vergne was shuffled back to eighth ahead of Michael Christensen’s #5 Penske Porsche as Richard Westbrook completed the top 10 in WEC full-season Ganassi Cadillac.
Tom Dillmann’s early effort aboard the Vanwall Vandervell 680 slotted him into 11th, ahead of Romain Dumas in the second Glickenhaus and Mathieu Jaminet’s #75 Porsche.
Source: Autosport