IMSA Mid-Ohio: Montoya puts Acura on top in first practice
Acura Team Penske’s Juan Pablo Montoya’s was fastest in opening practice for this weekend's Mid-Ohio IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship round, almost a quarter of a second up on the Action Express Racing Cadillac of Pipo Derani.
The #6 Acura ARX-05 of reigning IMSA champions Montoya and Dane Cameron lapped the 2.358-mile road course in 1min13.057sec to beat the #31 Cadillac by 0.236sec, while Ricky Taylor was just 0.009sec further back in the second Acura.
A late improvement from Harry Tincknell saw him beat Mazda teammate Oliver Jarvis by 0.02sec to land P4, albeit over half a second off the lead Acura.
Meanwhile the two JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillacs sandwiched the similar car of championship leader Renger van der Zande in the Wayne Taylor Racing entry.
In GT Le Mans, which comprises just four cars following Porsche’s withdrawal, Antonio Garcia was 0.3sec faster than Corvette Racing teammate Tommy Milner. The two BMW M8s were 0.84 and 1.28sec were off the pace.
In fact, Bruno Spengler’s M8 was less than 1sec faster than the Turner Motorsports BMW M6 of Bill Auberlen which topped GT Daytona.
Behind Auberlen by a mere 0.056sec was Jack Hawksworth in the faster of the two AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC Fs, with Alvaro Parente third in the Meyer Shank Racing Acura ahead of Pat Long’s Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R and Lawson Aschenbach in the Riley Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3.
The #30 Audi R8 of Hardpoint Racing, driven by Rob Ferriol and Spencer Pumpelly, did not take part in the session due to a technical problem.
Tomorrow’s practice session begins at 10.55am local (Eastern) time, with qualifying not being held until Sunday (raceday) morning.
Session results:
| Cla | Num | Driver | Class | Chassis | Time | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 6 |  Juan Pablo Montoya  Dane Cameron | DPi | Acura DPi | 1'13.057 | |
| 2 | 31 |  Felipe Nasr Pipo Derani | DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'13.293 | 0.236 |
| 3 | 7 | Helio Castroneves Ricky Taylor | DPi | Acura DPi | 1'13.302 | 0.245 |
| 4 | 55 | Jonathan Bomarito  Harry Tincknell | DPi | Mazda DPi | 1'13.598 | 0.541 |
| 5 | 77 | Oliver Jarvis Tristan Nunez | DPi | Mazda DPi | 1'13.618 | 0.561 |
| 6 | 5 |  Joao Barbosa  Sébastien Bourdais | DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'13.739 | 0.682 |
| 7 | 10 |  Renger van der Zande  Ryan Briscoe | DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'13.950 | 0.893 |
| 8 | 85 | Tristan Vautier Gabriel Aubry | DPi | Cadillac DPi | 1'14.561 | 1.504 |
| 9 | 3 |  Antonio Garcia Jordan Taylor | GTLM | Corvette C8.R | 1'19.690 | 6.633 |
| 10 | 4 | Oliver Gavin Tommy Milner | GTLM | Corvette C8.R | 1'19.991 | 6.934 |
| 11 | 24 |  Jesse Krohn John Edwards | GTLM | BMW M8 GTE | 1'20.527 | 7.470 |
| 12 | 25 |  Bruno Spengler Connor de Phillippi | GTLM | BMW M8 GTE | 1'20.966 | 7.909 |
| 13 | 96 | Bill Auberlen Robby Foley | GTD | BMW M6 GT3 | 1'21.861 | 8.804 |
| 14 | 14 | Jack Hawksworth Aaron Telitz | GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 1'21.917 | 8.860 |
| 15 | 57 | Alvaro Parente Mikhail Goikhberg | GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 1'21.993 | 8.936 |
| 16 | 16 | Ryan Hardwick Patrick Long | GTD | Porsche 911 GT3 R | 1'22.224 | 9.167 |
| 17 | 74 | Gar Robinson Lawson Aschenbach | GTD | Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 1'22.226 | 9.169 |
| 18 | 86 |  Mario Farnbacher Matt McMurry | GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 1'22.271 | 9.214 |
| 19 | 12 | Frankie Montecalvo Townsend Bell | GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 1'22.278 | 9.221 |
| 20 | 76 | Corey Fergus Paul Holton | GTD | McLaren 720S GT3 | 1'22.315 | 9.258 |
| 21 | 44 | Andy Lally John Potter | GTD | Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 1'22.325 | 9.268 |
| 22 | 23 | Ian James Roman De Angelis | GTD | Aston Martin Vantage GT3 | 1'23.038 | 9.981 |
| 23 | 22 | Till Bechtolsheimer Marc Miller | GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 1'23.284 | 10.227 |
| 24 | 30 | Rob Ferriol Spencer Pumpelly | GTD | Audi R8 LMS GT3 | 0.000 | |
| View full results | ||||||
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About this article
| Series | IMSA |
| Event | Mid-Ohio |
| Drivers | Juan Pablo Montoya |
| Teams | Team Penske |
| Author | David Malsher-Lopez |
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