Denver: GT qualifying notes

HENZLER SPEEDS TO DENVER GT POLE, THIRD OF 2005

DENVER (Aug. 13, 2005) -- German Wolf Henzler captured his third SCCA Pro Racing SPEED World Challenge GT pole position of 2005, and will lead the field at the standing start of Round Nine on Sunday from the CENTRIX Financial Grand Prix of Denver Presented by PacifiCare. Scotland's Robin Liddell will start second.

Driving the No. 55 Applied Materials/Farnbacher Loles Motorsports Porsche 911 Cup, Henzler turned a fast time of 1:15.121 (79.407 mph) on his second flying lap around the 1.657-mile Denver street circuit. Others, including Liddell and Max Papis, who will start third, made several attempts late in the 20-minute session, but Henzler's time held up for the pole.

"My team did a great job on the setup for me today and yesterday, also," Henzler said. "I think there was less grip than yesterday. The temperature was lower so everyone was faster on the straights. Maybe it was the rain washing away a little bit of the rubber on the track, which made it have less grip than yesterday."

Driving the No. 66 AXA Financial/PFAFF Porsche 911 Cup, Liddell turned his fastest lap on the second lap as well with a 1:15.260 (79.261 mph). However, Liddell returned to the track on two separate occasions, spinning once on a flier, but could not knock Henzler off the pole.

"When I did my fast lap, I came into the pits," Henzler said. "When Robin Liddell went back out, I went back out. And then when he came in, I came in again and then the session was over. I was just looking for the other drivers and seeing what they were doing."

Papis also made a last ditch attempt at the pole in his No. 16 XM Radio/Mobil 1/Motorola/Bose Cadillac CTS-V, and turned a lap time of 1:15.575 (78.930 mph) on his sixth lap. In eight laps overall, Papis posted five laps in the 1:15 range.

Rookie driver Lawson Aschenbach, of Gaithersburg, Md., will start fourth in the No. 07 King Auto/Farnbacher Loles Porsche 911 Cup as he makes his SPEED World Challenge debut, and Leighton Reese, of Minnetonka, Minn., will start fifth in his No. 6 Banner Engineering Corvette C6.

The SPEED GT portion of the CENTRIX Financial Grand Prix of Denver Presented by PacifiCare will run Sunday afternoon at 4:15 p.m. (MDT), and will be broadcast on SPEED Channel at 2 p.m. (EDT) on Saturday, Aug. 20.

-scca pro racing-