Laguna Seca: Chip Ganassi Racing qualifying report

DIAZ TO START ROAD &TRACK 250 SIXTH AFTER PRUETT'S QUALIFYING RUN

MONTEREY, Calif. (May 6, 2006) -- Scott Pruett's top Saturday practice time of 1:24.216 (95.668mph) gridded him seventh for the Rolex Sports Car Series qualifying race at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, but the 2004 Series Champion could only move up one position in the 30-minute sprint, relegating the no.01 CompUSA Lexus-Riley to a sixth-place result.

Pruett finished 12.302 seconds behind the no.23 Porsche-Crawford in the Daytona Prototype-only qualifying race, logging 21 laps in the event which precedes tomorrow's 112-lap feature at the U.S. Sports Car Invitational.

With the new qualifying race format (introduced in Virginia last month) comes a new point system that awards full race points based on finishing order. With the sixth-place finish today, the CompUSA team temporarily drops out of second in the Rolex Series Team point standings, falling to third (175) in the standings behind the no.23 Porsche-Crawford (199) and the no.19 Ford-Crawford who finished fourth (177).

The Road & Track 250, Round 6 of the Rolex Sports Car Series season, airs tomorrow at 3:00 p.m. ET (LIVE) on SPEED Channel.

CGRFS Driver Quoteboard

SCOTT PRUETT "The car was just really loose-in and loose-off the corners. It seemed like everyone got so jammed up at the start that we couldn't go anywhere. It's tough to get off to a good start when you're boxed in like that. So as a result, we were beating and banging on each other in the pack while the guys who started out front got to stretch their legs a bit. It's a tough deal, but we made the most of it, and we'll be ready to challenge them in the race tomorrow."

-cgr-