Race Weekend Central

Ricky Taylor Wins Pole for Mobil 1 Sportscar Grand Prix

On Saturday afternoon, Ricky Taylor reaffirmed the pace of the Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R.  Taylor lapped the 2.459-mile Canadian Tire Motorsports Park in 68.459 seconds (129.310 mph), good enough to claim the pole for Sunday’s Mobil 1 Sportscar Grand Prix.  The lap is an IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship track record for Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.

Despite Taylor’s pace, the session was actually quite close.  JDC/Miler MotorSports’ Misha Goikhberg was just over one-eighth of a second back in the No. 85 ORECA 07-Gibson.  He will start on the outside of the front row.

Row No. 2 will be occupied by Tequila Patron ESM.  Team owner Scott Sharp qualified third in the No. 2 Nissan DPi, while Johannes van Overbeek will start fourth in the No. 22.  The two Nissan DPis were separated by less than half a tenth of a second.  Mazda Motorsports’ Jonathan Bomarito will start fifth.

In Prototype Challenge, Performance Tech Motorsports maintained a sizable gap over BAR1 Motorsports.  James French was fastest with a lap of 71.471 seconds (123,859 mph).  While the lap was not as fast as what Patricio O’Ward was able to do in practice No. 3, it was more than enough to claim the class pole.  French was 1.722 seconds faster than BAR1 Motorsports’ Garret Grist in the No. 26.

In GT Le Mans, the session looked like a runaway at first.  Porsche GT Team put down some quick laps early and seemed to be quite a ways ahead of the rest of the pack.  Ultimately, that was not the case.

Regardless, Dirk Werner was still able to claim the class pole for Porsche with a lap of 74.085 seconds (119.489 mph).  It is the first pole for the newest version of the Porsche 911 RSR.  Werner’s lap was a mere 18-thousandths of a second faster than BMW Team RLL’s Bill Auberlen in second.   Porsche GT Team’s Laurens Vanthoor will start third, followed by BMW’s Martin Tomczyk and Ryan Briscoe in the No. 67 Ford.  The top five in class were separated by just over a third of a second and the entire class by a little over eight-tenths.

In GT Daytona, the quick times went back and forth throughout the session.  However, it was 3GT Racing’s Sage Karam that was fastest with a lap of 76.563 seconds (115.622 mph).  It is the first IMSA pole for the Lexus RCF GT3.

Karam’s lap was a tenth and a half faster than Andrew Davis in Stevenson Motorsports’ Audi.  Jeff Segal was third quickest in the No. 86 Acura, followed by Bryan Sellers in the Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3.  Scuderia Corsa’s Christina Nielsen will start fifth in class.

3GT Racing’s No. 15 Lexus did not participate in the session after Jack Hawksworth‘s big crash in practice No. 3.  During his post-qualifying interview with IMSA Radio’s Shea Adam, Karam mentioned that the team is hard at work repairing the damage.  The team believes that the No. 15 will be good to go to start Sunday’s race from the rear of the field.

Results of IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Mobil 1 Sportscar Grand Prix Qualifying

The Mobil 1 Sportscar Grand Prix is scheduled to start shortly after Noon on Sunday.  The race will air live on FOX Sports 1.

About the author

Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.

Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.

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