Bourdais Leads CGR Front Row Sweep at Long Beach

Photo: IMSA

Sebastien Bourdais will start Saturday’s Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach from the pole following a record-breaking lap from the Frenchman in qualifying.

Bourdais stormed to a quick lap of 1:09.472 lap in the No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R to outpace the sister No. 02 car of Alex Lynn by 0.361 seconds.

Lynn’s 1:09.833 lap time came in the final moments of the 15-minute session, which marked a new qualifying track record for the four-time Champ Car champion.

Bourdais, who scored his second consecutive IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship pole, will share driving duties with Renger van der Zande in the 100-minute contest.

The No. 60 Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-05 of Tom Blomqvist qualified third ahead of Pipo Derani, who sat on provisional pole for the majority of the session before getting shuffled down the order after pitting his No. 31 Action Express Racing Cadillac.

Tristan Vautier completed the top-five in the No. 5 JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac, which went into the Turn 1 run-off area during one of the Frenchman’s runs.

Filipe Albuquerque clocked in the sixth and slowest time in the DPi class, some 1.1 seconds adrift from Bourdais’ pole-winning lap. 

Taylor Takes Last-Gasp Pole in GTD Pro

Jordan Taylor scored a last-gasp pole in GTD Pro, denying BMW a sweep of the top positions in both classes.

Taylor reeled off a best lap of 1:18.048 in his No. 3 Chevrolet Corvette C8.R GTD to edge out the No. 25 Team RLL BMW M4 GT3 of Connor De Phillippi by 0.067 seconds.

Mathieu Jaminet was third quickest in the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R followed by the No. 23 The Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 of Ross Gunn.

Madison Snow took pole in GTD with the fifth quickest time among the GTD Pro/GTD entries, taking his No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW to a 1:18.487 lap time in the closing moments of the 15-minute session.

Snow, who set a new class qualifying lap record, was 0.112 seconds quicker than the No. 96 Turner Motorsport BMW of Robby Foley in second.

Mike Skeen will start third in class in the No. 32 Team Korthoff Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, with Jon Miller and Russell Ward completing the top-five in GTD for Crucial Motorsports and Winward Racing, respectively.

The Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach gets underway Saturday at 2 p.m. PT (5 p.m. ET) with live coverage on USA Network and IMSA Radio.

RESULTS: Qualifying

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John