De Phillippi Paces Opening Practice at VIR

Photo: Rick Dole/IMSA

Connor De Phillippi led the way in opening practice for this weekend’s Michelin GT Challenge at Virginia International Raceway.

De Phillippi reeled off a best lap of 1:45.196 in the No. 25 Team RLL BMW M4 GT3 early on to outpace the GTD class pace-setting No. 32 Team Korthoff Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo of Mike Skeen by 0.152 seconds.

The No. 16 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R of Jan Heylen was third overall and second in GTD, followed by Bryan Sellers in the No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW in fourth.

GTD Pro points leader Matt Campbell completed the top-five in the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche, meanwhile.

The majority of the fast times came early on with rain impacting the closing moments of the 60-minute session.

The only incident came from the No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Mercedes of Jules Gounon, who had an off-course excursion, damaging the Proton Competition-run entry.

Gounon completed only 12 laps in the session as a result, with the car having been taken back to the garage.

Practice 2 gets underway Saturday at 10:40 a.m. ET.

RESULTS: Practice 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