DragonSpeed’s O’Ward Quickest Overall in Wet Opening Practice

Photo: Jake Galstad/IMSA

A late flyer by Pato O’Ward put the LMP2 class DragonSpeed Oreca 07 Gibson car quickest overall in a rain-affected opening practice for the Rolex 24 at Daytona.

The NTT IndyCar Series star reeled off a 1:49.251 late in the session to edge out the DPi pace-setting No. 02 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R of Earl Bamber by 0.016 seconds.

Seven LMP2 cars made up the top-ten quickest times overall in the 90-minute session, which ran without any red flags.

The No. 13 AWA Duqueine D08 Nissan of Matt Bell was quickest of the LMP3 cars, which slotted behind both the GTD Pro and GTD pace-setters.

Mathieu Jaminet went fastest in GTD Pro, thanks to a late 1:56.784 lap time by the Frenchman in the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R.

The No. 75 SunEnergy1 Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo of Luca Stolz had been the quickest among the GTD cars prior to the Porsche factory driver’s late flyer.

Stolz’s 1:58.419 lap time, however, was still good enough to end up quickest in the GTD class.

Forty-seven of the 61 cars entered set times in the session, which featured persistent light rain but no major incidents. 

Practice 2 gets underway at 3:20 p.m. ET, with rain in the forecast for the remainder of the day.

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