PJ Hyett took pole position for the IMSA SportsCar Championship at the LMP2-led round at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park.
Hyett’s AO Racing ORECA beat the similar cars of Daniel Goldburg (United Autosports) and Gar Robinson (Riley) in qualifying for Sunday’s race, which features a 34-car entry.
The premier class GTP hybrids have taken a break from the fearsome 2.459-mile, 10-turn road course near Toronto, formerly known as Mosport. Although those cars weren’t here, some of the top drivers still made the trip north of the border to drive the LMP2 machinery.
But, as per the series rules, the stars had to stand down for qualifying.
Goldburg set the benchmark at 1m10.119s, outpacing George Kurtz (Crowdstrike by APR) by 0.061s, but a red flag was quickly required when Dennis Andersen shunted the #20 MDK by High Class Racing at Turn 2. He was able to walk away from the wreckage after a high-speed spin ended in the tyrewall at the unforgiving track.
With only five minutes on the clock for the resumption, finding a clear lap was at a premium. Robinson snatched provisional pole with a 1m10.031s and then a 1m09.690s.
The times then tumbled, with Hyett – who will share with Louis Deletraz tomorrow – taking P1 with 1m09.582s, from Goldburg’s 1m09.672s. But the red flag flew again when Luis Perez Companc ploughed his #88 AF Corse entry underneath the tyrewall at Turn 3.
Robinson will start third, ahead of Nick Boulle’s #52 Inter Europol by PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports entry. Steven Thomas was fifth quickest for TDS Racing, ahead of Kurtz, Ben Keating (#2 United Autosports) and John Farano (Tower Motorsports).
The session was restarted, but not for enough time for anyone to set a laptime.
Corvette beats Lexus in GTD Pro
In GTD, qualifying got off to a false start when the red flag flew for Conquest Racing’s Ferrari 296, when Manny Franco ground to a halt at the pit exit.
That led to a truncated 10-minute sprint to decide pole, with Vasser Sullivan’s Jack Hawksworth becoming the first to dip under the 1m15s bracket with a 1m14.972s in his #14 Lexus RC F.
Fellow Brit Alexander Sims, driving the #3 Corvette Z06 GT3.R grabbed provisional pole from him with 1m14.911s, only for Hawksworth to snatch it back with 1m14.710s.
Sims then unleashed a 1m14.405s, taking the top spot by 0.235s, to which Hawksworth could not respond. Sims rubbed it in by going even quicker on his last lap, with a 1m14.373s – extending his advantage to 0.267s. That meant he’d set two laps good enough for pole.
“The car was incredible around this amazing place, I got a couple of really nice, clear laps – that was a really good blast,” said Sims. “We hadn’t been sure which direction to go in practice, but we had such a good car for qualifying.”
Frankie Montecalvo led the pro-am class in his #12 Lexus, impressively leading a phalanx of Pro class cars. “It’s absolutely my favourite racetrack that really suits our RC F,” he said.
Tommy Milner will start fourth in the #4 Corvette, seven tenths off his stable-mate Sims, ahead of Harry Tincknell (#64 Multimatic Ford Mustang), Madison Snow (Paul Miller Racing BMW M4), Mario Farnbacher (#23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage) and Marvin Kirchhofer (Pfaff Motorsports McLaren 720S).
