IMSA Mid-Ohio: Montoya puts Acura on top in first practice
Acura Team Penske’s Juan Pablo Montoya’s was fastest in opening practice for this weekend's Mid-Ohio IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship round, almost a quarter of a second up on the Action Express Racing Cadillac of Pipo Derani.
Photo by: Art Fleischmann
The #6 Acura ARX-05 of reigning IMSA champions Montoya and Dane Cameron lapped the 2.358-mile road course in 1min13.057sec to beat the #31 Cadillac by 0.236sec, while Ricky Taylor was just 0.009sec further back in the second Acura.
A late improvement from Harry Tincknell saw him beat Mazda teammate Oliver Jarvis by 0.02sec to land P4, albeit over half a second off the lead Acura.
Meanwhile the two JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillacs sandwiched the similar car of championship leader Renger van der Zande in the Wayne Taylor Racing entry.
In GT Le Mans, which comprises just four cars following Porsche’s withdrawal, Antonio Garcia was 0.3sec faster than Corvette Racing teammate Tommy Milner. The two BMW M8s were 0.84 and 1.28sec were off the pace.
In fact, Bruno Spengler’s M8 was less than 1sec faster than the Turner Motorsports BMW M6 of Bill Auberlen which topped GT Daytona.
Behind Auberlen by a mere 0.056sec was Jack Hawksworth in the faster of the two AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC Fs, with Alvaro Parente third in the Meyer Shank Racing Acura ahead of Pat Long’s Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R and Lawson Aschenbach in the Riley Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3.
The #30 Audi R8 of Hardpoint Racing, driven by Rob Ferriol and Spencer Pumpelly, did not take part in the session due to a technical problem.
Tomorrow’s practice session begins at 10.55am local (Eastern) time, with qualifying not being held until Sunday (raceday) morning.
Session results:
Cla | Num | Driver | Class | Chassis | Time | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | 6 |
Juan Pablo Montoya
Dane Cameron |
DPi | Acura DPi | 1'13.057 | |
2 | 31 |
Felipe Nasr
Pipo Derani |
DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'13.293 | 0.236 |
3 | 7 |
Helio Castroneves
Ricky Taylor |
DPi | Acura DPi | 1'13.302 | 0.245 |
4 | 55 |
Jonathan Bomarito
Harry Tincknell |
DPi | Mazda DPi | 1'13.598 | 0.541 |
5 | 77 |
Oliver Jarvis
Tristan Nunez |
DPi | Mazda DPi | 1'13.618 | 0.561 |
6 | 5 |
Joao Barbosa
Sébastien Bourdais |
DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'13.739 | 0.682 |
7 | 10 |
Renger van der Zande
Ryan Briscoe |
DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'13.950 | 0.893 |
8 | 85 |
Tristan Vautier
Gabriel Aubry |
DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'14.561 | 1.504 |
9 | 3 |
Antonio Garcia
Jordan Taylor |
GTLM | Corvette C8.R | 1'19.690 | 6.633 |
10 | 4 |
Oliver Gavin
Tommy Milner |
GTLM | Corvette C8.R | 1'19.991 | 6.934 |
11 | 24 |
Jesse Krohn
John Edwards |
GTLM | BMW M8 GTE | 1'20.527 | 7.470 |
12 | 25 |
Bruno Spengler
Connor de Phillippi |
GTLM | BMW M8 GTE | 1'20.966 | 7.909 |
13 | 96 |
Bill Auberlen
Robby Foley |
GTD | BMW M6 GT3 | 1'21.861 | 8.804 |
14 | 14 |
Jack Hawksworth
Aaron Telitz |
GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 1'21.917 | 8.860 |
15 | 57 |
Alvaro Parente
Mikhail Goikhberg |
GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 1'21.993 | 8.936 |
16 | 16 |
Ryan Hardwick
Patrick Long |
GTD | Porsche 911 GT3 R | 1'22.224 | 9.167 |
17 | 74 |
Gar Robinson
Lawson Aschenbach |
GTD | Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 1'22.226 | 9.169 |
18 | 86 |
Mario Farnbacher
Matt McMurry |
GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 1'22.271 | 9.214 |
19 | 12 |
Frankie Montecalvo
Townsend Bell |
GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 1'22.278 | 9.221 |
20 | 76 |
Corey Fergus
Paul Holton |
GTD | McLaren 720S GT3 | 1'22.315 | 9.258 |
21 | 44 |
Andy Lally
John Potter |
GTD | Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 1'22.325 | 9.268 |
22 | 23 |
Ian James
Roman De Angelis |
GTD | Aston Martin Vantage GT3 | 1'23.038 | 9.981 |
23 | 22 |
Till Bechtolsheimer
Marc Miller |
GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 1'23.284 | 10.227 |
24 | 30 |
Rob Ferriol
Spencer Pumpelly |
GTD | Audi R8 LMS GT3 | 0.000 | |
View full results |
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