Alex Zanardi qualifies sixth at scene of his Paralympic triumphs.

Brands Hatch (GB), 17th May. It was a very happy and proud Alex Zanardi (IT) who stood on the Brands Hatch (GB) race track tonight to look back on his triumphs there in 2012 in the Paralympics and look ahead to his second race weekend in the 2014 Blancpain Sprint Series.

Hanging round his neck were the two gold medals he won on his handbike that summer two years ago, while in the pits was his BMW Z4 GT3 that is being entered in the series by ROAL Motorsport. The Italian had laid the foundations for a good Sunday when he qualified sixth for the Qualifying Race in the afternoon sessions. He was in the top ten in both free practice sessions and Q1 and Q2, so making it into the top ten and through to Q3. Then in the final session he set a time that was less than eight tenths of a second behind that of the pole winning Audi driven by Laurens Vanthoor (NL) and Cesar Ramos (BR). He was also the highest placed BMW driver.

The BMW works driver’s thoughts ahead of the two one-hour long races tomorrow were: “For me Brands Hatch has proved a very special place, as the memories from the Paralympics are still fresh with me, and then to come back and do so well in my BMW is just amazing. I am sure we have an incredible pace. We seem to be able to perform much better at the distance in comparison to the guys around us. To overtake is another matter, as it is going to be tough, but for sure we should be in the position to push hard and to try and improve our position. I am very happy at 47 years of age being a race driver and sitting in sixth place in my second race in this series with such a competitive field. I am very proud of the job BMW Motorsport and ROAL Motorsport have done for me, and all the encouraging help given to me by Munich from BMW. I keep my fingers crossed for tomorrow’s two races.”