Acura and Porsche just ahead in qualifying

Motorsport-Magazin.com – The qualifying of the IMSA series for the 6h race on Road Atlanta was a very close affair. On the 4.0 kilometer route, the gaps were extremely small, especially in the DPi and GTLM classes. Pole position ultimately went to Acura (DPi), Porsche (GTLM) and Lexus (GTD).

Castroneves in the Penske-Acura # 7 (Castroneves / Taylor) prevailed wafer-thinly against Felipe Nasr in the Action Express Cadillac # 31 (Nasr / Derani / Albuquerque). Castroneves’ pole time was 1: 08.674 minutes, Nasr was only 0.056 seconds slower. The sister car # 6 (Montoya / Cameron) was also less than a tenth of a second away from pole. Behind them were both Mazdas, followed by the rest of the Cadillacs.

The LMP2 class is extremely thin with only two vehicles this weekend. In qualifying the PR1-Oreca # 52 (Kelly / Trummer / Huffacker) drove the faster time.

It was brutally tight in the GTLM class, where all six vehicles were ultimately within two tenths of a second. Pole went to Porsche again. Nick Tandy in the Porsche # 911 (Tandy / Makowiecki) set the fastest time in 1: 16.167, followed by both Corvettes # 3 (Garcia / Taylor) and # 4 (Gavin / Milner). Behind them were the second Porsche # 912 (Bamber / Vanthoor) and the two BMWs.

In the end, there were four different makes in the top 4 in the GTD class. Lexus was ahead once again. Frankie Montecalvo in the Lexus # 12 from AIM Vasser-Sullivan (Montecalvo / Bell / Telitz) prevailed with a 1: 19.757. Behind them were the Miller-Lamborghini # 48 (Sellers / Snow / Lewis) and the Wright-Porsche # 16 (Hardwick / Long / Heylen).

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