Maxwell, Piscitell Score CTSC Poles at Daytona

Scott Maxwell (GS) and Justin Piscitell (ST) have scored the pole positions for the Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge season-opening BMW Performance 200 at Daytona International Speedway.

Interestingly, both Multimatic Motorsports and Murillo Racing scored the 2014 poles at Daytona as well.

Maxwell banked a 1:56.520 in the No. 15 Multimatic Ford Mustang Boss 302R. Jade Buford set the pole a year ago at 1:55.824; Buford will now be in the sister No. 158 this year with new co-driver Austin Cindric.

The pole is Maxwell’s ninth in his CTSC career.

“Billy and I focused on race setup on old tires most of the weekend,” Maxwell said. “We didn’t know how it would be on stickers. But I was confident enough it would be strong. We didn’t take advantage of the draft.”

Hugh Plumb took the No. 13 Rum Bum Racing Porsche 911 into second at 1:56.779, with Andrew Davis third in the No. 6 Stevenson Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro Z/28.R at 1:56.941.

Cindric qualified fourth, with Matt Bell fifth in the second Stevenson entry, the No. 9 Camaro Z/28.R.

Ashley Freiberg, who co-drove to victory in 2014 with Shelby Blackstock, lines up sixth in the No. 46 Fall-Line Motorsports BMW M3 she’ll share with defending GS class champion Trent Hindman.

Murillo Racing scored its second straight Daytona ST pole, albeit with a different driver and different car than it did a year ago.

Piscitell, in the team’s No. 56 Porsche Cayman, set the fastest time of the session at a 2:05.454 to score his first pole with the team. The time is down a bit from Jeff Mosing’s 2:04.769 set last year in the team’s BMW 328i. Piscitell co-drives with defending class champion Eric Foss.

“We’re sad Jeff Mosing isn’t here with us (this weekend),” Piscitell said. “I believe his wife is due the moment the race starts. So I’m fortunate to fill in.

“I have to thank Continental Tire; we threw a set of stickers on and the grip levels went up so much. I got a huge tow out there, and for the ST guys it could be worth quite a few tenths on the straight.”

Jason Briedis upheld BMW’s honor as the lone non-Cayman in the top five. He took the No. 84 Bimmerworld 328i to second at 2:05.462, just 0.004 of a second off Piscitell’s pace.

The Rennsport One teammates of Jon Miller and Luis Rodriguez took the Nos. 18 and 17 Caymans into third and fourth, with Jeff Segal fifth in the No. 42 Team Sahlen Porsche Cayman.

Friday’s season-opening, two-hour and 30-minute BMW Performance 200 will go green at 1:45 p.m. ET and local time. It will be streamed via IMSA.TV, per IMSA.

RESULTS: Qualifying