IMSA: Pla leads again on Saturday at Roar Before the Rolex 24

By foxsports
Published

Olivier Pla was fastest for a second consecutive day at the Roar Before the Rolex 24 test, with the best time of the day coming during the 90-minute night practice at 1:39.687 in the No. 60 Michael Shank Racing Ligier JS P2 Honda.

Beyond the Shank Ligier, the DeltaWing showed continued impressive pace for a second straight day. Katherine Legge led the fog-affected morning session, then lowered the mark to 1:39.955 at night to end second on the day in the No. 0 DeltaWing DWC13 coupe.

Ricky Taylor led the two-hour, 45-minute second practice at 1:40.032, best time of the day for a Daytona Prototype, in the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette DP. The Taylor car clocked in third at night, albeit at a slower 1:40.596.

The biggest moment of the day in the Prototype ranks involved the second Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Riley-Ford, with Scott Dixon having a rare incident in the No. 02 car in the morning. Despite some slight rear end damage, the car returned to the track later in the day.

Maro Engel's 1:43.175 in the No. 88 Starworks Motorsport Oreca FLM09 stood as the fastest time of the day in Prototype Challenge, with Tom Kimber-Smith and Jack Hawksworth leading the other two sessions later in the day.

Three different manufacturers led the three different sessions in GT Le Mans. Corvette paced the morning session with Mike Rockenfeller at a 1:45.256, Ferrari's Alessandro Pier Guidi led the afternoon at 1:45.266, and lastly Bruno Spengler took BMW to a 1:45.510 in the evening.

Interestingly, the No. 67 Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GT was second in each of the three sessions. Porsche wasn't far off either, but was at least three tenths in arrears of the fastest GTLM car in each session.

Fabio Babini in the No. 28 Konrad Motorsport Lamborghini Huracan GT3 led both the morning and afternoon sessions at 1:48.553 and 1:48.309, respectively, in GT Daytona. However that car needed a tow-in at the end of the night session and ended fifth at night.

Lamborghini still led the evening session, with Mirko Bortolotti taking the No. 48 Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 to the fastest lap of the day in GTD at 1:48.230.

Park Place Motorsports headed into the evening with repairs to make to the right front of its new No. 73 Porsche 911 GT3 R, following an accident for Patrick Lindsey in Turn 5.

While Lindsey was OK, the Park Place crew was hard at work before leaving the track, trying to see whether the car was fixable to continue for the remainder of the weekend.

There were several red flags throughout the day in all classes and all sessions, but not the volume of heavy attrition as seemed to occur on Friday.

Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge

The two Ford Shelby GT350R-Cs led the two Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge practice sessions at Daytona on Saturday.

Scott Maxwell posted the fastest time of the day overall and in GS, in the afternoon at 1:57.823 in the No. 15 Multimatic Motorsports Ford Shelby GT350R-C.

Pierre Kleinubing led the morning session at 1:58.129 in the No. 76 Compass360 Racing Ford.

Meanwhile Seth Thomas paced both ST sessions in the No. 38 Next Level European Porsche Cayman, with a 2:06.136 in the morning and a quicker 2:06.061 in the afternoon.