Watkins Glen 240 IMSA: Taylor beats Pla to pole
Acuras will line up 1-2 again at Watkins Glen, this time for the 2hr40min IMSA race that replaces Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in the 2021 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.
Watch: IMSA: Watkins Glen 240 - Taylor beats Pla to pole
Ricky Taylor delivered an excellent 1min30.058sec lap in the Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-05 to beat the similar car of Meyer Shank Racing, driven by Olivier Pla, by 0.346sec.
After a highly entertaining session, Kevin Magnussen emerged fastest of the Cadillac DPi-V.R drivers, claiming third ahead of Pipo Derani’s Action Express Racing Caddy.
The hero of the Six Hours of The Glen, Harry Tincknell in the Mazda RT24-P, ran wide enough at Turn 8 to snatch an advertising sign on his front-left corner, so that he was unable to improve his time as the track conditions improved. The Mazda will start fifth, ahead of the JDC-Miller MotorSports Cadillac.
PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports’ Ben Keating stole LMP2 pole with a brilliant run to the checkered flag with a lap 0.423sec quicker than Steven Thomas’ best in the WIN Autosport car.
Theodor Olsen spun away a chance to start on the front row of the six-car LMP3 pack and brought out the red flag with 2mins remaining.
By then, Matteo Llarena in the Performance Tech Motorsports had proven the class of the field, 0.735sec ahead of Jon Bennett’s CORE autosport machine and 1sec ahead of Jarett Andretti in the Andretti Autosport machine.
In the GT Le Mans battle, Jordan Taylor put the #3 Corvette on pole for the second straight week at Watkins Glen, with 0.224sec margin over Nick Tandy.
In the GT Daytona session that set the class’s grid line-up, Madison Snow’s Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 topped the times with a 1min59.380sec lap, 0.440sec faster than Frankie Montecalvo’s best effort in the #12 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F GT3.
Richard Heistand was next up in the Carbahn Peregringe Racing Audi R8 LMS, followed by the two Acura NSX GT3s of Gradient Racing and Compass Racing respectively, with Roman De Angelis sixth in the Aston Martin Vantage GT3 from Heart of Racing.
Then the Pros came out to decide qualifying points, and Bill Auberlen went to the top of the speed charts with his first flyer in the Turner Motorsports BMW M6 GT3, but dived down the inside of the Compass Acura – now driven by Mario Farnbacher – at Turn 6 and spun off.
Despite this distraction, the pair of them showed superbly over the remainder of the session, winding up second and fourth respectively. But neither of them had an answer for the #14 VSR Lexus of Jack Hawksworth which emerged quickest by half a second over Auberlen, with Daniel Morad clocking third in the Alegra Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3.
Qualifying results:
Cla | Num | Driver | Class | Chassis | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 10 |
Ricky Taylor
Filipe Albuquerque |
DPi | Acura DPi | 1'30.058 | |
2 | 60 |
Dane Cameron
Olivier Pla |
DPi | Acura DPi | 1'30.404 | 0.346 |
4 | 31 |
Felipe Nasr
Pipo Derani |
DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'30.684 | 0.626 |
5 | 55 |
Oliver Jarvis
Harry Tincknell |
DPi | Mazda DPi | 1'30.947 | 0.889 |
6 | 5 |
Tristan Vautier
Loic Duval |
DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'31.094 | 1.036 |
7 | 52 |
Ben Keating
Mikkel Jensen |
LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 1'34.969 | 4.911 |
8 | 11 |
Thomas Steven
Tristan Nunez |
LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 1'35.392 | 5.334 |
9 | 8 |
John Farano
Gabriel Aubry |
LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 1'39.644 | 9.586 |
10 | 38 |
Rasmus Lindh
Mateo Llarena |
LMP3 | Ligier JS P320 | 1'42.633 | 12.575 |
11 | 54 |
Jon Bennett
Colin Braun |
LMP3 | Ligier JS P320 | 1'43.368 | 13.310 |
12 | 36 |
Jarett Andretti
Oliver Askew |
LMP3 | Ligier JS P320 | 1'43.608 | 13.550 |
13 | 3 |
Antonio Garcia
Jordan Taylor |
GTLM | Corvette C8.R | 1'43.821 | 13.763 |
14 | 4 |
Tommy Milner
Nick Tandy |
GTLM | Corvette C8.R | 1'44.045 | 13.987 |
15 | 74 |
Gar Robinson
Felipe Fraga |
LMP3 | Ligier JS P320 | 1'44.650 | 14.592 |
16 | 84 |
Theodor Olsen
Dominic Cicero |
LMP3 | Ligier JS P320 | 1'49.677 | 19.619 |
17 | 91 |
Jim Cox
Dylan Murry |
LMP3 | Ligier JS P320 | 1'50.230 | 20.172 |
18 | 79 |
Cooper MacNeil
Matt Campbell |
GTLM | Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | 1'57.420 | 27.362 |
19 | 1 |
Bryan Sellers
Madison Snow |
GTD | Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 1'59.380 | 29.322 |
20 | 12 |
Frankie Montecalvo
Zach Veach |
GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 1'59.820 | 29.762 |
21 | 39 |
Richard Heistand
Jeff Westphal |
GTD | Audi R8 LMS GT3 | 2'00.946 | 30.888 |
22 | 66 |
Till Bechtolsheimer
Marc Miller |
GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 2'01.146 | 31.088 |
23 | 76 |
Jeff Kingsley
Mario Farnbacher |
GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 2'01.146 | 31.088 |
24 | 23 |
Roman De Angelis
Ross Gunn |
GTD | Aston Martin Vantage GT3 | 2'01.198 | 31.140 |
25 | 28 |
Michael de Quesada
Daniel Morad |
GTD | Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 2'01.201 | 31.143 |
26 | 14 |
Aaron Telitz
Jack Hawksworth |
GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 2'01.396 | 31.338 |
27 | 96 |
Bill Auberlen
Robby Foley |
GTD | BMW M6 GT3 | 2'01.894 | 31.836 |
28 | 88 |
Rob Ferriol
Katherine Legge |
GTD | Porsche 911 GT3 R | 2'02.907 | 32.849 |
29 | 32 |
Guy Cosmo
Shane Lewis |
GTD | Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 2'04.610 | 34.552 |
30 | 19 |
Mikhail Goikhberg
Franck Perera |
GTD | Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | ||
View full results |
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