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Spirit of Daytona Corvette Leads Practice 1 at Daytona

Spirit of Daytona, Corvette C7.R leaders in TUSC Practice 1…

Photo: John Dagys

Photo: John Dagys

Corvette led two of the four TUDOR United SportsCar Championship classes in the opening one-hour practice session for the Rolex 24 at Daytona on Thursday morning.

Richard Westbrook posted the fastest overall and P class time in the No. 90 Spirit of Daytona Corvette DP at 1:39.462, ahead of the No. 5 Action Express Racing Corvette DP (Christian Fittipaldi, 1:39.764) and No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates Ford EcoBoost Riley (Scott Pruett, 1:40.147).

Colin Braun led the PC class times in the No. 54 CORE autosport ORECA FLM09 at 1:43.023. The No. 87 BAR1 Motorsports and No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports rounded out the top three.

In the GT ranks, Corvette Racing led the GTLM class timesheets with Antonio Garcia in the No. 3 Corvette C7.R clocking in at 1:46.036.

Garcia was only a fraction ahead of Marc Goossens in the No. 91 SRT Viper GTS-R at 1:46.090 and Darren Turner in the No. 97 Aston Martin Vantage at 1:46.101.

GTD also featured three manufacturers in the top three spots, with the No. 46 Fall-Line Motorsports Audi R8 top of the charts with Oliver Jarvis’ 1:47.892.

Damien Faulkner was second in the No. 81 GB Autosport Porsche 911 GT America at 1:48.077 and James Davison in third in the No. 007 TRG-AMR Aston Martin Vantage at 1:48.139.

The session was interrupted by two red flags, the second of which was for an extended time period after multiple cars spun from oil laid down at the kink.

Fall-Line’s Audi and the No. 94 Turner Motorsport BMW Z4 GT3 were included, but contact would occur later on between the No. 23 Team Seattle/AJR Porsche 911 GT America and the GTLM class No. 55 BMW Team RLL Z4 GTE.

Bill Auberlen spun and came to rest. Alex Riberas, in the Team Seattle Porsche, spun as well and made contact with the parked Auberlen. Both cars returned to the paddock on a flatbed truck.

Riberas was checked and released from the infield care center.

The second practice session runs from 1:15 to 1:45 p.m. ET this afternoon, in the final tune-up before qualifying later this afternoon.

RESULTS: Practice 1

Tony DiZinno (@tonydizinno) is Sportscar365's North American Editor, focusing on coverage of the IMSA-sanctioned championships as well as Pirelli World Challenge. DiZinno also contributes to NBCSports.com and other motorsports outlets. Contact Tony

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