Porsche Rebounds, Christensen Quickest in Warmup at VIR

Photo: John Dagys

With its newly built No. 911 Porsche 911 RSR, Michael Christensen topped the time charts in morning warmup for today’s Oak Tree Grand Prix.

The Dane, who has been drafted into replace Richard Liet — who broke his arm in a heavy accident yesterday — turned a best lap of 1:44.260 in the 20-minute session, which ran without incident.

It was the first laps of the new car, built up around a spare chassis yesterday by the CORE autosport-run factory squad following Lietz’s accident.

Christensen will be pulling double-duty in today’s race, starting the No. 911 before handing over to Nick Tandy, while doing the closing stint in the No. 912 entry, which will be started by Patrick Long.

The No. 17 Team Falken Tire Porsche of Wolf Henzler and the Tommy Milner-driven No. 4 Corvette C7.R completed the top-three.

Jordan Taylor, who is a last-minute replacement for Jan Magnussen, who hasn’t been cleared to race following yesterday’s accident, was fifth quickest in the No. 4 Corvette.

Leh Keen, meanwhile, led the way in GT Daytona, posting a 1:48.432 in his No. 23 Alex Job Racing Porsche 911 GT America.

Prototype Challenge cars, meanwhile, had its own separate warmup, which saw Colin Braun top the time sheets with a best lap of 1:40.852.

Race 2 for PC is set for 10:45 a.m. ET, live on IMSA.com, while the Oak Tree Grand Prix GTLM/GTD feature gets underway at 4:05 p.m. ET, live on FOX Sports 1.

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