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Laguna Seca: Ian Baas qualifying report
Baas Qualifies Third For SPEED World Challenge Touring Car Season Finale at Laguna Seca MONTEREY, Calif., Oct. 20 - Ian Baas showed the way for both Audi and STaSIS Motorsport Saturday morning at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca when he qualified third ...
Published: Oct 21, 2007, 5:41 AM
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Baas Qualifies Third For SPEED World Challenge Touring Car Season Finale at Laguna Seca
MONTEREY, Calif., Oct. 20 - Ian Baas showed the way for both Audi and STaSIS Motorsport Saturday morning at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca when he qualified third for Sunday's SPEED World Challenge Touring Car season finale.
Running his fastest lap on his fourth of eight trips around the 2.238-mile, 11-turn road course in the 20-minute qualifying session, the Noblesville, Ind.-based driver was timed in 1:36.081 for an average speed of 83.854 miles per hour. That was only 0.224 off Randy Pobst's pole-winning time, and 0.199 off the time recorded by Peter Cunningham, who will start second tomorrow. A total of 23 drivers recorded qualifying times.
"We fixed some problems that we had yesterday, and we knew we had a good car for qualifying," Baas said afterwards.
Getting a clear lap in qualifying can be a challenge here, so Baas waited until everybody else left the pits before he took to the track in order to avoid as much traffic as possible. Once he got going, "everything went according to our plan," he said.
"We progressively got faster every lap, and I feel our fastest lap was when our tires were at their peak," he said. "After we set our fastest lap we tried to cool down the tires and take another run at it, but a lot of people had dragged gravel onto the track by then, and I knew we probably wouldn't better our time. I'm happy with third in qualifying here."
Baas's STaSIS Motorsport Audi A4 No. 18 advertises Team Janica Racing, silvertrek.com, STaSIS, Clear Capital and a charity that Baas helps, the Think First National Injury Foundation. It will begin its charge from the inside of Row 2 tomorrow, beside the Acura of Pierre Kleinubing.
"Audi is tied with Acura for the manufacturer's championship, so we need to try to finish in front of the Acuras tomorrow," Baas pointed out.
Baas was seventh in the first practice session Friday morning with a 1:37.019 (83.043 mph), and eighth in the second practice session that afternoon with a 1:36.985 (83.072 mph). He ended up ninth fastest for the day on Friday when both practice sessions were compared. \
-credit: restart communications
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