VIR IMSA: Vanthoor tops first practice for Porsche

The session was run in hot and dry conditions, but rain is predicted for this afternoon’s session.

The #912 Porsche had a grassy off in Vanthoor’s hands after a handful of laps. After a pitstop to clean it up he lapped in 1m41.529s, which he soon lowered to 1m41.296s to top the times.

“My first run felt pretty good, but obviously we still have a lot more homework to do,” said Vanthoor.

Nick Tandy made it a Porsche 1-2 in the sister #911 car, while the Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GTs of Ryan Briscoe and Dirk Muller were third and fourth respectively, ahead of the Chevrolet Corvette C7.Rs of Jan Magnussen and Oliver Gavin.

The BMW M8s of John Edwards and Connor de Phillippi rounded out the GTLM runners.

In GT Daytona, the order was much more dynamic and top spot changed hands a number of times.

Jeroen Bleekemolen set the fastest time in his Riley Motorsports Mercedes AMG-GT3, a tenth clear of Patrick Long’s Park Place Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R.

There was trouble for the points-leading #86 Meyer Shank Racing Acura NSX GT3, which failed to join the session at the green light due to a technical issue. Once remedied, Mario Farnbacher lapped only ninth-fastest.

Session results:

Cla	Num	Driver	Class	Chassis	Time	Gap
1	912	Earl Bamber Laurens Vanthoor	GTLM	Porsche 911 RSR	1'41.296
2	911	Patrick Pilet Nick Tandy	GTLM	Porsche 911 RSR	1'41.435	0.139
3	67	Ryan Briscoe Richard Westbrook	GTLM	Ford GT	1'41.478	0.182
4	66	Joey Hand Dirk Muller	GTLM	Ford GT	1'41.626	0.330
5	3	Jan Magnussen Antonio Garcia	GTLM	Corvette C7.R	1'41.662	0.366
6	4	Oliver Gavin Tommy Milner	GTLM	Corvette C7.R	1'41.878	0.582
7	24	Jesse Krohn John Edwards	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	1'42.232	0.936
8	25	Tom Blomqvist Connor de Phillippi	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	1'43.019	1.723
9	33	Ben Keating Jeroen Bleekemolen	GTD	Mercedes-AMG GT3	1'44.336	3.040
10	73	Patrick Lindsey Patrick Long	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	1'44.677	3.381
11	44	John Potter Andy Lally	GTD	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	1'44.733	3.437
12	14	Richard Heistand Jack Hawksworth	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	1'44.778	3.482
13	63	Cooper MacNeil Toni Vilander	GTD	Ferrari 488 GT3	1'44.835	3.539
14	48	Bryan Sellers Corey Lewis	GTD	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	1'44.961	3.665
15	96	Bill Auberlen Robby Foley	GTD	BMW M6 GT3	1'45.123	3.827
16	76	Paul Holton Matt Plumb	GTD	McLaren 720S GT3	1'45.280	3.984
17	86	Mario Farnbacher Trent Hindman	GTD	Acura NSX GT3	1'45.305	4.009
18	74	Gar Robinson Lawson Aschenbach	GTD	Mercedes-AMG	1'45.370	4.074
19	57	Katherine Legge Alice Powell	GTD	Acura NSX GT3	1'45.486	4.190
20	12	Frankie Montecalvo Townsend Bell	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	1'45.741	4.445
21	9	Scott Hargrove Zacharie Robichon	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	1'45.789	4.493
View full results