Practice report

Petit Le Mans: Cadillacs dominate opening practice

Filipe Albuquerque and Felipe Nasr gave Action Express Racing a 1-2 in first practice at Road Atlanta, with Jordan Taylor third in Wayne Taylor Racing’s similar Cadillac DPi-V.R.

Albuquerque set a fastest time of 1min11.878sec to beat Nasr by 0.274sec, with Taylor less than half a tenth behind, as preparations began for the 10-hour IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship finale.

Ricky Taylor slotted the faster of the Acura Team Penske ARX-05s into fourth, but enduro co-driver Graham Rahal ground to a halt on track reporting loss of drive and bringing the one-hour session to a slightly early end.

The session's other red flag was caused when the #99 JDC Miller Motorsports Oreca stopped on course.

Oliver Jarvis was within half a second of the top time in the Mazda RT24-P, with Colin Braun sixth in the CORE autosport Oreca, just ahead of the two ESM Nissans.

In GT Le Mans, Dirk Muller and Ryan Briscoe delivered a 1-2 for Chip Ganassi Racing’s Ford GTs ahead of championship favorite Antonio Garcia in the #3 Corvette C7.R and Laurens Vanthoor in the #912 Porsche 911 RSR.

GT Daytona was led by Christopher Mies in the Land Motorsport Audi R8, with Jack Hawksworth clocking second fastest time for Lexus.

Markus Palttala (Turner Motorsports BMW M6), Jeroen Bleekemolen (Mercedes AMG GT), Patrick Long (Wright Motorsports Porsche 911), Bryan Sellers (Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini) and Daniel Serra (Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488) ensured seven different manufacturers filled the top seven places.

Second practice begins at 3.15pm local (Eastern) time.

IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship FP1

Cla	Num	Driver	Class	Chassis	Laps	Time	Gap	Interval	km/h
1	5	Christian Fittipaldi Filipe Albuquerque Tristan Vautier	P	Cadillac DPi	32	1'11.878			127.216
2	31	Eric Curran Gabby Chaves Felipe Nasr	P	Cadillac DPi	13	1'12.152	0.274	0.274	126.732
3	10	Jordan Taylor Ryan Hunter-Reay Renger van der Zande	P	Cadillac DPi	28	1'12.197	0.319	0.045	126.653
4	7	Helio Castroneves Graham Rahal Ricky Taylor	P	Acura DPi	25	1'12.330	0.452	0.133	126.421
5	77	Lucas di Grassi Oliver Jarvis Tristan Nunez	P	Mazda DPi	32	1'12.366	0.488	0.036	126.358
6	54	Romain Dumas Jon Bennett Colin Braun	P	ORECA LMP2	35	1'12.426	0.548	0.060	126.253
7	22	Timo Bernhard Pipo Derani Johannes van Overbeek	P	Nissan DPi	35	1'12.477	0.599	0.051	126.164
8	2	Scott Sharp Ryan Dalziel Norman Nato	P	Nissan DPi	32	1'12.572	0.694	0.095	125.999
9	6	Juan Pablo Simon Pagenaud Dane Cameron	P	Acura DPi	23	1'12.816	0.938	0.244	125.577
10	85	Simon Trummer Robert Alon Devlin DeFrancesco	P	ORECA LMP2	29	1'13.082	1.204	0.266	125.120
11	99	Mikhail Goikhberg Chris Miller Stephen Simpson	P	ORECA LMP2	33	1'13.229	1.351	0.147	124.869
12	52	Jose Gutierrez Sebastian Saavedra Will Owen	P	ORECA LMP2	34	1'13.328	1.450	0.099	124.700
13	55	Spencer Pigot Jonathan Bomarito Marino Franchitti	P	Mazda DPi	34	1'13.377	1.499	0.049	124.617
14	38	James French Nicholas Boulle Kyle Masson	P	ORECA LMP2	23	1'13.772	1.894	0.395	123.949
15	66	Sébastien Bourdais Joey Hand Dirk Muller	GTLM	Ford GT	25	1'18.343	6.465	4.571	116.718
16	67	Ryan Briscoe Scott Dixon Richard Westbrook	GTLM	Ford GT	18	1'18.381	6.503	0.038	116.661
17	3	Jan Magnussen Marcel Fassler Antonio Garcia	GTLM	Corvette C7.R	28	1'18.595	6.717	0.214	116.343
18	912	Earl Bamber Laurens Vanthoor Mathieu Jaminet	GTLM	Porsche 911 RSR	31	1'18.843	6.965	0.248	115.977
19	4	Marcel Fassler Oliver Gavin Tommy Milner	GTLM	Corvette C7.R	30	1'18.870	6.992	0.027	115.938
20	911	Nick Tandy Patrick Pilet Frédéric Makowiecki	GTLM	Porsche 911 RSR	27	1'18.960	7.082	0.090	115.805
21	24	John Edwards Jesse Krohn Chaz Mostert	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	26	1'19.270	7.392	0.310	115.353
22	25	Bill Auberlen Connor de Phillippi Alexander Sims	GTLM	BMW M8 GTE	28	1'19.277	7.399	0.007	115.342
23	62	Toni Vilander Andrea Bertolini Miguel Molina	GTLM	Ferrari 488 GTE	31	1'19.580	7.702	0.303	114.903
24	29	Daniel Morad Christopher Mies Sheldon Van	GTD	Audi R8 LMS GT3	32	1'20.283	8.405	0.703	113.897
25	15	David Heinemeier Hansson Jack Hawksworth Sean Rayhall	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	17	1'20.659	8.781	0.376	113.366
26	96	Don Yount Markus Palttala Dillon Machavern	GTD	BMW M6 GT3	32	1'20.805	8.927	0.146	113.161
27	33	Jeroen Bleekemolen Ben Keating Luca Stolz	GTD	Mercedes-AMG GT3	30	1'20.820	8.942	0.015	113.140
28	58	Patrick Long Christina Nielsen Robert Renauer	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	31	1'20.837	8.959	0.017	113.117
29	48	Corey Lewis Bryan Sellers Madison Snow	GTD	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	32	1'20.853	8.975	0.016	113.094
30	63	Daniel Serra Cooper MacNeil Gunnar Jeannette	GTD	Ferrari 488 GT3	31	1'20.891	9.013	0.038	113.041
31	44	Andy Lally Andrew Davis John Potter	GTD	Audi R8 LMS GT3	29	1'20.971	9.093	0.080	112.929
32	93	Justin Marks Lawson Aschenbach Mario Farnbacher	GTD	Acura NSX GT3	27	1'21.268	9.390	0.297	112.517
33	86	Alvaro Parente Katherine Legge Trent Hindman	GTD	Acura NSX GT3	28	1'21.298	9.420	0.030	112.475
34	14	Kyle Marcelli Dominik Baumann Philipp Frommenwiler	GTD	Lexus RC F GT3	24	1'21.392	9.514	0.094	112.345
35	73	Wolf Henzler Tim Pappas Spencer Pumpelly	GTD	Porsche 911 GT3 R	30	1'21.397	9.519	0.005	112.338
36	64	Matteo Cressoni Townsend Bell Frankie Montecalvo	GTD	Ferrari 488 GT3	33	1'21.562	9.684	0.165	112.111
37	71	Maximilian Buhk JC Perez Felipe Fraga	GTD	Mercedes-AMG GT3	13	1'24.367	12.489	2.805	108.384