Derani Blazes Field in Opening Practice at Laguna Seca

Photo: Jake Galstad/IMSA

Pipo Derani stormed to the top of the time charts in the opening practice session of the weekend for Sunday’s Monterey Sports Car Championship at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca.

The Action Express Racing driver took his No. 31 Whelen Engineering-sponsored Cadillac DPi-V.R to a best lap of 1:15.851 early in the session, outpacing the field by more than a half-second.

Renger van der Zande, in the DPi championship-leading No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing entry, made it a Cadillac 1-2 late in the session, thanks to a 1:16.370 lap time by the Dutchman.

It displaced the pair of Acura Team Penske entries to third and fourth, with the No. 77 Multimatic Mazda RT24-P of Oliver Jarvis completing the top-five.

Antonio Garcia led the way in GT Le Mans, thanks to a 1:21.898 lap time by the Spaniard in the No. 3 Chevrolet Corvette C8.R.

It was 0.132 seconds quicker than Nick Tandy, who was second in class.

GT Daytona was paced by Bill Auberlen in the No. 96 Turner Motorsport BMW M6 GT3, ahead of Andy Lally’s GRT Magnus Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo and Mario Farnbacher’s No. 86 Meyer Shank Racing Acura NSX GT3 Evo.

Six different GT3 manufacturers were represented in the top-six in class.

No major incidents were reported during the session, other than a brief red flag for debris in the closing 20 minutes.

The second and final practice session of the day is on tap for 12 p.m. PDT.

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