Menard runs to Trans Am pole at VIR

Paul Menard in the No. 3 Pittsburgh Paints/Menards Ford Mustang will lead the field to green in Sunday's Trans Am Series presented by Pirelli race at VIRginia International Raceway after capturing the pole award with a fast time of 1m43.566s, besting Chris Dyson (No. 16 GYM WEED Ford Mustang) by only 0.085s.

“It has been a really good weekend for our Pittsburgh Paints and Stains/Menards Ford Mustang,” said Menard. “We struggled here last year. We had a pretty rough session last year, but wound up winning that race, and this year we applied what we learned. All the sessions – qualifying, new tires – mean something. We stickered up this morning to see how the tires fall off during a 10-lap run, and we have a good idea of how that's going to go. In qualifying, just drove it in harder, used a little more throttle through the esses, normal qualifying stuff, just kind of suck it up. The car stuck; I’m really proud of my boys, it’s awesome to get another pole award. We only have one this year, so now this is number two, and we'll try to get a couple more before the year is out. But big picture, protect our championship lead.”

Billy Griffin (No. 14 Griffin Auto Care Mercedes AMG GT3) was quickest in XGT, while Joshua Carlson (No. 36 Enseva/Diercks Ltd./TC Fab Ford Mustang) topped SGT. Chris Coffey (No. 97 Norwood Auto Italia/Traffic Grafix Maserati MC GT4) was fastest in GT and Jon DeGaynor (No. 04 Speed Dream’n Racing Ford Mustang) was best in GT1 Challenge.

The VIR SpeedTour TA/GT race will be contested Sunday at 1:00 p.m. ET. It will be streamed live on Trans Am’s YouTube channel, @TheTransAmSeries and broadcast live on SPEED SPORT 1, with coverage beginning at 12:30 p.m. ET. An encore presentation will air on SPEED SPORT 1 Sunday at 8:30 p.m. ET. For more information on where you can watch SPEED SPORT 1, click here.

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