Albuquerque Leaves it Late to Set Night Practice Pace

Filipe Albuquerque squeezed in a last-gasp improvement to beat fellow Acura driver Tom Blomqvist to the top of the overall times in night practice for Motul Petit Le Mans.

The Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport driver left it until the very end of the 90-minute session to set the fastest lap time of 1:11.296 in the No. 10 Acura ARX-06.

Albuquerque edged out Blomqvist in the No. 60 Meyer Shank Racing car by just three-thousandths of a second around the 2.54-mile Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta.

Third place went to Matt Campbell in the No. 7 Penske Porsche 963, while Action Express Racing’s Jack Aitken was fourth in the best of the Cadillac V-Series.Rs.

Aitken was the pace-setter after half an hour of running with a 1:11.713 but the British driver was pushed down to fourth despite shaving a tenth off his best effort.

Laurens Vanthoor completed the top five in the No. 6 factory Porsche, while Renger van der Zande was sixth aboard the Chip Ganassi Racing’s No. 01 Cadillac that led the opening two practice sessions on Thursday in the hands of Sebastien Bourdais.

The two BMW M Hybrid V8s came through in seventh and ninth, interlocking with the privateer Porsches from Proton Competition and JDC-Miller Motorsports.

The Proton car ran through the gravel at the chicane after the left-front wheel detached during Neel Jani’s stint, although the Swiss driver managed to crawl it back to the pits.

Mirko Bortolotti set the pace in the GTD Pro class for Iron Lynx, posting a time of 1:19.803 in the factory-driven No. 63 Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2.

Bortolotti beat Turner Motorsport BMW driver Bill Auberlen, who led the GTD class, by a margin of 0.095 seconds.

It was an eclectic top four in the combined GTD ranks as Julien Andlauer put the Kellymoss with Riley Porsche 911 GT3 R in third, ahead of the Pro-class WeatherTech Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo of Jules Gounon.

In a session without red flags, Racers Edge Motorsports with WTR Acura driver Kyle Marcelli had an off-track moment at Turn 1 but he was able to keep the car out of the wall.

Mikkel Jensen went three-tenths clear at the top of LMP2 for TDS Racing, while Nico Varrone led the way in LMP3 for the AWA Duqueine squad.

RESULTS: Practice 3