Twenty-five Hours of Thunderhill grid set

The 25 Hours of Thunderhill presented by Hawk Brakes is ready for tomorrow's 11 a.m. green flag. Brian Frisselle will start the twice around the clock plus one hour event sanctioned by the National Auto Sport Association (NASA) on the overall pole at Thunderhill Raceway in Willows, Calif.

 The competitors were limited on practice most of the day when fog rolled in forcing the NASA Officials to stop practice. Teams were forced to rely on the rain laps that they ran on Thursday for their qualifying set-ups. The field took to the 2.86-mile track located 40-minutes from Sacramento in rainy and dark conditions for the 30-minute qualifying session. Brian Frisselle overcame the rain to put the No. 17 Davidson Racing Norma on the overall pole. Frisselle turned a lap of 2:11.175 that will see him pace the 55 car field to the green flag for the start of the 25 Hours of Thunderhill tomorrow morning.

"It was pretty good lap," Frisselle said. "The Davidson Norma was set-up really good for the wet conditions and I was able to get a reasonably traffic free lap and it was good enough for the pole. The rain was coming pretty good, but we have good downforce on the car. The Norma is running really good and we are looking forward to leading the field to the green flag tomorrow."

 ESR: Mike Skeen had the wheel of the No. 03 Team Quick Super Lite putting in a lap of 2:13.390. "We were just trying to keep the car on the track and put in a safe lap," Skeen said. "We just bolted on some rain tires, turned up the wing and went for it. The lap was good enough for the pole in our class. We really just wanted to be in the top five. We wanted to have a good car for tomorrow. There is a lot of speed in the car. We didn't do many laps today. So there is a lot left for the race." 

E0: Randy Mueller put in a lap time of 2:21.198 to put the No. 68 Pure Performance BMW on the EO Class pole. "It was a hectic lap with the rain," Mueller said. "The windshield was fogged up so visibility was limited. I just went back to the basics and put in a good lap. We just did a couple of laps and were able to get the pole. We just softened the shocks for the most part. We could have made it faster for the conditions, but we wanted to make it easier to set back for the expected dry conditions for tomorrow."

E1: James Clay put the No. 82 BimmerWorld BMW on pole in the E1 Class with a time of 2:25.559. "It was kind of a crazy deal with the rain," Clay said. "We knew we would be running in the rain so we made some adjustments. We have a great BMW E46 which is a very solid car in the rain and in the dry. Our rain set-up is a few clicks of the shocks. This weekend we are expecting mixed conditions so we can make those simple adjustments in the pits for the conditions." 

E2: Joel Miller had the controls of the No. 34 RDR Mazda RX-8 putting it on the class pole with a lap of 2:26.352. "It was way fun out there, I wish they would have left me out all night," Miller said. "The funny part is our car's name is Kermit the Frog, it loves the rain. It was a good run. We got lucky with that safety car. There were three cars in front of me and when it went green again the three cars pitted, so I had a clean lap. It was wet, but it was good fun. The whole year in the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship we did no running in the rain so it was good to get some wet laps."

E3: Hernan Palermo drove the No. 35 SP Racing Mazda Miata to the pole position in the E3 Class, posting a lap time of 2:30.971. "It was slick. It was raining, but it was fun," Palermo said. "I was trying to catch my teammate Will Faules, since he had the faster lap early on in the session. I was able to find a little grip later and get the pole. All we did was disconnect the rear sway-bar and bolt on some rain tires for qualifying."

Chura and Associates