Colin Braun claimed overall pole for this weekend’s Six Hours of The Glen in CORE Autosport’s No. 54 Oreca 07 with a time of 1:32.350. The 29-year-old driver bested the efforts of United Autosports’ Paul di Resta who set the provisional fastest time halfway through the session before eventually settling for second in his No. 32 Ligier JS P217.
This marks the first all-LMP2 front row of the 2018 IMSA season, bringing variety to the mainly DPi-ruled campaign thus far. Ricky Taylor was the top placing Daytona Prototype international driver in the Acura Team Penske ARX-05, beating his teammate Dean Cameron by 0.144 seconds for third place.
Other noteworthy action from the Prototype segment of qualifying included Pipo Derani coming to a halt in the No. 22 ESM Nissan Onroak DPi. While unconfirmed, a believed engine problem forced him to pull aside after setting a sixth-fastest time of 1:33.092 around the New York circuit. The team will work on the car throughout the night and is expected to field the car for Sunday’s race start.
The No. 77 Mazda RT24-P was absent from qualifying after Rene Rast’s incident in FP3, causing major front and rear end damage.
Westbrook Fastest in GTLM
Richard Westbrook paced the field in his No. 67 Ford GT, setting a quickest lap of 1:41.948. He completed the session just over a tenth of a second quicker than his Chip Ganassi Racing stablemate Joey Hand in the No. 66 Ford entry, marking a sweep of the top two spots in GTLM.
Corvette Racing followed in short order and will fill the second row with the No. 4 C7.R qualifying in third and the No. 3 in fourth.
Porsche’s Earl Bamber placed himself and Le Mans-winner Laurens Vanthoor in P5, 0.108 seconds ahead of Patrick Pilet and Nick Tandy in the No. 911 Porsche.
Finally, rounding out the class grid and sitting on the fourth row is BMW Team RLL. The crew’s No. 24 BMW M8 GTE earned the best spot of the two albeit over 1.4 seconds off the pace of Westbrook. Connor De Phillippi finished quali in eighth with a time of 1:43.539.
Hawksworth Pilots No. 15 Lexus RC F GT3 to GTD Pole
Jack Hawksworth kept up 3GT Racing’s pickup in pace on Saturday by spearheading the team’s charge to pole in GT Daytona. They were able to top the timesheets ahead of Land Motorsport’s Christopher Mies in the No. 29 Audi R8 LMS GT3, among others. Hawksworth’s teammate, Kyle Marcelli, lapped Watkins Glen third-fastest in the No. 14 Lexus.
Sunday’s annual Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen will begin at 9:30 a.m. EST on Fox Sports 1.