Lime Rock IMSA: Vanthoor takes pole in Porsche front-row lockout

Tandy set the fastest first sector in the #911 Porsche, but Vanthoor clawed that deficit and more back over Sectors 2 and 3 to claim pole by 0.052sec.

Vanthoor’s margin of less than 0.2sec over the fastest non-Porsche was perhaps less than expected given the 911 RSRs' pace in practice, but a bigger surprise was the identity of their nearest challenger.

Connor De Phillippi set a brilliant 49.322sec in the #25 BMW M8, over half a second faster than teammate John Edwards and well able to outpace Dirk Muller in the Ford GT and the two Corvette C7.Rs of Antonio Garcia and Oliver Gavin.

Ryan Briscoe in the #67 Ford and Edwards will roll off from the fourth row.

A close battle in GT Daytona saw Trent Hindman dig deep for his third pole of the season in the Meyer Shank Racing Acura NSX, setting a new track record and beating Ben Keating in the Riley Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 by 0.026sec.

The Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3, qualified this week by Corey Lewis who is subbing for Ryan Hardwick, was just a further 0.05sec in arrears while behind him Robby Foley slotted the Turner Motorsport BMW M6 into fourth, despite being only 0.08sec from top spot.

Zacharie Robichon was fastest of the Porsches, grabbing fifth for Pfaff Motorsports ahead of the quicker of the two AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC Fs, the #14 of Richard Heistand.

The Northeast Grand Prix begins at 3.10pm local (Eastern) time.

Session results:

Cla	Num	Driver	Class	Chassis	Time	Gap
1	912	Earl Bamber Laurens Vanthoor	GTLM	Porsche 911 RSR	49.133
2	911	Patrick Pilet Nick Tandy	GTLM	Porsche 911 RSR	49.185	0.052
3	25	Tom Blomqvist Connor de Phillippi	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	49.322	0.189
4	66	Joey Hand Dirk Muller	GTLM	Ford GT	49.458	0.325
5	3	Jan Magnussen Antonio Garcia	GTLM	Corvette C7.R	49.690	0.557
6	4	Oliver Gavin Marcel Fassler	GTLM	Corvette C7.R	49.748	0.615
7	67	Ryan Briscoe Richard Westbrook	GTLM	Ford GT	49.808	0.675
8	24	Jesse Krohn John Edwards	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	49.864	0.731
9	86	Mario Farnbacher Trent Hindman	GTD	Acura NSX GT3	51.456	2.323
10	33	Ben Keating Jeroen Bleekemolen	GTD	Mercedes-AMG GT3	51.482	2.349
11	48	Bryan Sellers Corey Lewis	GTD	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	51.532	2.399
12	96	Bill Auberlen Robby Foley	GTD	BMW M6 GT3	51.536	2.403
13	9	Dennis Olsen Zacharie Robichon	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	51.575	2.442
14	14	Richard Heistand Jack Hawksworth	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	51.642	2.509
15	73	Marco Seefried Patrick Long	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	51.661	2.528
16	63	Cooper MacNeil Toni Vilander	GTD	Ferrari 488 GT3	51.719	2.586
17	91	Anthony Imperato Matt Campbell	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	51.785	2.652
18	76	Paul Holton Matt Plumb	GTD	McLaren 720S GT3	52.008	2.875
19	57	Katherine Legge Christina Nielsen	GTD	Acura NSX GT3	52.059	2.926
20	11	John Potter Andy Lally	GTD	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	52.226	3.093
21	12	Frankie Montecalvo Townsend Bell	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	52.236	3.103
View full results