Lawrence Claims TOTAL Pole Award For Petit Le Mans At Road Atlanta

Subtitle:Riley Motorsports Capture GTD Pole On Last Lap

Riley Motorsports driver Cameron Lawrence swiped the GT Daytona (GTD) TOTAL Pole Award away from second-place qualifier Spencer Pumpelly on the final lap of Friday’s qualifying session, posting a best lap of 1:38.295 (93.026 mph).

Lawrence, who co-drives the No. 93 TI Automotive/Viper Exchange.com Dodge Viper SRT GT3-R with Marc Goossens and Al Carter, has won two of the three races Tequila Patrón North American Endurance Cup events they’ve competed in this year, winning most recently at the Six Hours of The Glen.

Qualifying the No. 73 Park Place Porsche/UiS Porsche 911 GT America second with a time of 1:38.886 (92.470 mph) was Pumpelly, who co-drives the Park Place Porsche entry with Patrick Lindsey. This would have been the team’s second pole of the season, after Lindsey captured the TOTAL Pole Award in August at Road America.

Third in the No. 22 WeatherTech Porsche 911 GT America with a time of 1:38.889 (92.458 mph) was Leh Keen, just 0.013 seconds behind Pumpelly. Keen, who is an Atlanta, Georgia native, will share the Alex Job Racing entry with regular co-driver Cooper MacNeil and fellow Georgian Andrew Davis. Earlier in the day, Davis won the IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge championship earlier in the No. 6 Stevenson Motorsports Camaro Z/28.R with co-driver Robin Liddell.

NOTES:

- Petit Le Mans powered by Mazda also serves as the final event in the Tequila Patrón North American Endurance Cup, a 52-hour competition combining the classic races at Daytona, Sebring and Watkins Glen.

- GTD points leader Christina Nielsen qualified eighth in the No. 007 Royal Purple/Orion Energy/LaSalle Solutions/PassTime USA Aston Martin Vantage with a time of 1:42.911 (88.853 mph). Nielsen enters Saturday’s race with a one-point lead in the GTD standings over ninth-place qualifier Dion von Motlke and his No. 48 Paul Miler Racing Castrol EDGE Audi R8 LMS co-driver, Christopher Haase.

QUOTES:

Cameron Lawrence, Driver – No.  Castrol EDGE Audi R8 LMS

“Definitely an interesting way to get my first pole the way the weather is. It’s been tricky working with this rain, we weren’t sure what we were going to get. The car was really good, we’ve been working on the balance. After the wet conditions at The Glen it really helped without experience with this car. We kept pushing harder and harder on every lap and it felt like the conditions were getting worse. And then I just kept pushing deeper and deeper to put together a fast lap, and was able to get the pole. It’s been our goal since Daytona to focus on the [Tequila] Patrón [North American] Endurance Cup. We’ve just been working on the segments as best as we can. We try to come away with the maximum points we can at each race.

“It’s nice to be back in the car, it’s been a while since we’ve been in after The Glen. Hopefully we can push toward the end and come home with a win here tomorrow. We really wanted to save the car, especially leading in the Patrón Endurance Cup. We didn’t need to push anything right off the bat. They said to push as hard as I was comfortable with, but we’ve been quick in all the practice sessions, and lap after lap we found a little more confidence and a little more grip. I was just really thrilled and really surprised, but it really shows what kind of car we have.”

Saturday’s on-track activity opens with a 20-minute warm-up session beginning at 8 a.m. ET.