Image by Jake Galstad/LAT
Mazdas 1-2 again in pre-qualifying Roar session
Mazda continued to improve in IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Roar Before the Rolex 24 practice Sunday morning at Daytona International Speedway, running a weekend-best lap of 1m34.224s in the No. 55 Team Joest Mazda DPi.
Mazda went 1-2, with Oliver Jarvis second with a lap of 1m34.616s at the end of the session. Next were the two Action Express Cadillacs, with Eric Curran at 1m34.821s in the No. 31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac DPi-V.R., followed by Filipe Albuquerque, at 1m34.885s in the No. 5 Mustang Sampling entry.
Teams had just a short break before qualifying begins at 11:50 a.m. ET for the GTLM class, followed at 12:15 p.m. for the combined DPi and LMP2 competitors.
While no official records will be set during qualifying, not only will Joao Barbosa’s two-year-old DPi track mark of 1m36.903s be under attack, but P.J. Jones’ 26-year-old all-time IMSA Camel GTP record of 1m33.875s faces its first serious challenge to date.
Ben Hanley led the LMP2 competitors with a best lap of the weekend, a 1m35.975s, coming on his last lap in the No. 81 DragonSpeed ORECA Gibson.
Richard Westbrook was fastest in GTLM, running 1m43.083s in the No. 67 Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GT, beating his best lap of the weekend for the category.
J.J. O'Malley
J.J. O’Malley became news editor for Chris Economaki in 1977, launching him on a career covering all facets of motorsports in many capacities. He did public relations at Watkins Glen International for 14 years; followed by four seasons at Homestead-Miami Speedway; news editor at ISC Publications (now Edgeset Marketing); and communications manager for Grand-Am and IMSA. He’s currently completing his 13th book on racing – a history of the Daytona Prototype – in addition to covering events for RACER.com, Edgeset Marketing and Sunday Group Management. O’Malley is an honorary member of the prestigious Road Racing Drivers Club.
Read J.J. O'Malley's articles
Latest News
Comments
Comments are disabled until you accept Social Networking Cookies. Update cookie preferences
If the dialog doesn't appear, ad-blockers are often the cause; try disabling yours or see our Social Features Support.