Oliver Jarvis edged his teammate Harry Tincknell to lead the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship qualifying session at the Roar Before the 24 and claimed the preferred pit and garage location for his Team Joest-run team.
Jarvis’ best lap was a mere 0.025 seconds faster than Tincknell’s fastest tour and just under a second quicker than the closest competitor from another manufacturer.
The lap, clocked at 1:33.398, was significantly quicker than Felipe Nasr’s session-topping lap from this session at last year’s Roar, a 1:35.806.
Ricky Taylor was the next closest challenger in third in the No. 7 Team Penske Acura ARX-05 with the No. 5 Mustang Sampling Action Express Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R hot on his heals.
Albuquerque’s teammate Felipe Nasr completed the top five in the No. 31 Whelen Engineering entry from AXR.
Gabriel Aubry was the fastest in four-car LMP2 field in the No. 52 Oreca 07 Gibson for PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports, followed by the No. 81 DragonSpeed car of James Allen.
Corvette Paces GT Le Mans Qualifying
Jan Magnussen secured prime pit and garage real estate for Corvette Racing with his session-best lap in the No. 3 Chevrolet Corvette C7.R.
The Dane fended off challenges from both Ford Chip Ganassi entries in the 15 minute session with the No. 67 and No. 66 Ford GTs setting the second and third fastest times in class at the hands of Richard Westbrook and Joey Hand, respectively.
Earl Bamber and Nick Tandy took the final two spots of the top five for the Porsche GT Team, followed by Davide Rigon’s Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE and John Edwards in the first of the BMW Team RLL BMW M8 GTE entries.
The field of nine cars was covered by 0.640 seconds, and all nine were under the 1:43.610 lap time that was enough for Joey Hand to top this same session at the Roar last year.
One final hour-long testing session for DPi, LMP2, and GTLM class cars is scheduled for 2:45 p.m. ET this afternoon.
RESULTS: Qualifying (DPi/LMP2/GTLM)