Laurens Vanthoor nailed a 49.133sec lap of Lime Rock Park to edge Porsche teammate Nick Tandy and take the #912 car’s first pole of the 2019 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship for this afternoon’s Northeast Grand Prix.
Tandy set the fastest first sector in the #911 Porsche, but Vanthoor clawed that deficit and more back over Sectors 2 and 3 to claim pole by 0.052sec.
Vanthoor’s margin of less than 0.2sec over the fastest non-Porsche was perhaps less than expected given the 911 RSRs’ pace in practice, but a bigger surprise was the identity of their nearest challenger.
Connor De Phillippi set a brilliant 49.322sec in the #25 BMW M8, over half a second faster than teammate John Edwards and well able to outpace Dirk Muller in the Ford GT and the two Corvette C7.Rs of Antonio Garcia and Oliver Gavin.
Ryan Briscoe in the #67 Ford and Edwards will roll off from the fourth row.
A close battle in GT Daytona saw Trent Hindman dig deep for his third pole of the season in the Meyer Shank Racing Acura NSX, setting a new track record and beating Ben Keating in the Riley Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 by 0.026sec.
The Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3, qualified this week by Corey Lewis who is subbing for Ryan Hardwick, was just a further 0.05sec in arrears while behind him Robby Foley slotted the Turner Motorsport BMW M6 into fourth, despite being only 0.08sec from top spot.
Zacharie Robichon was fastest of the Porsches, grabbing fifth for Pfaff Motorsports ahead of the quicker of the two AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC Fs, the #14 of Richard Heistand.
The Northeast Grand Prix begins at 3.10pm local (Eastern) time.
Session results:
| Cla | Num | Driver | Class | Chassis | Time | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 912 |  Earl Bamber  Laurens Vanthoor | GTLM | Porsche 911 RSR | 49.133 | |
| 2 | 911 |  Patrick Pilet  Nick Tandy | GTLM | Porsche 911 RSR | 49.185 | 0.052 |
| 3 | 25 | Tom Blomqvist  Connor de Phillippi | GTLM | BMW M8 GTE | 49.322 | 0.189 |
| 4 | 66 | Joey Hand  Dirk Muller | GTLM | Ford GT | 49.458 | 0.325 |
| 5 | 3 |  Jan Magnussen  Antonio Garcia | GTLM | Corvette C7.R | 49.690 | 0.557 |
| 6 | 4 | Oliver Gavin  Marcel Fassler | GTLM | Corvette C7.R | 49.748 | 0.615 |
| 7 | 67 |  Ryan Briscoe Richard Westbrook | GTLM | Ford GT | 49.808 | 0.675 |
| 8 | 24 |  Jesse Krohn John Edwards | GTLM | BMW M8 GTE | 49.864 | 0.731 |
| 9 | 86 | Mario Farnbacher Trent Hindman | GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 51.456 | 2.323 |
| 10 | 33 | Ben Keating  Jeroen Bleekemolen | GTD | Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 51.482 | 2.349 |
| 11 | 48 | Bryan Sellers Corey Lewis | GTD | Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 51.532 | 2.399 |
| 12 | 96 | Bill Auberlen Robby Foley | GTD | BMW M6 GT3 | 51.536 | 2.403 |
| 13 | 9 |  Dennis Olsen  Zacharie Robichon | GTD | Porsche 911 GT3 R | 51.575 | 2.442 |
| 14 | 14 | Richard Heistand Jack Hawksworth | GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 51.642 | 2.509 |
| 15 | 73 | Marco Seefried Patrick Long | GTD | Porsche 911 GT3 R | 51.661 | 2.528 |
| 16 | 63 | Cooper MacNeil Toni Vilander | GTD | Ferrari 488 GT3 | 51.719 | 2.586 |
| 17 | 91 | Anthony Imperato Matt Campbell | GTD | Porsche 911 GT3 R | 51.785 | 2.652 |
| 18 | 76 | Paul Holton Matt Plumb | GTD | McLaren 720S GT3 | 52.008 | 2.875 |
| 19 | 57 | Katherine Legge Christina Nielsen | GTD | Acura NSX GT3 | 52.059 | 2.926 |
| 20 | 11 | John Potter Andy Lally | GTD | Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 52.226 | 3.093 |
| 21 | 12 | Frankie Montecalvo Townsend Bell | GTD | Lexus RC F GT3 | 52.236 | 3.103 |
| View full results | ||||||
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