Ricky Taylor Rockets to Austin Pole

Photo: Brian Cleary/BCPix.com

Ricky Taylor has scored his first IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship pole of the season, in qualifying for Saturday’s Lone Star Le Mans at Circuit of The Americas.

Taylor reeled off a quick lap of 1:58.712 lap in his No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette DP to edge out the No. 55 Mazda Prototype of Tristan Nunez by just 0.003 seconds.

He denied Mazda’s third consecutive pole, with the pair of Multimatic-built prototypes set to start second and third on the grid, in the hands of Tristan Nunez and Joel Miller.

The No. 31 Action Express Racing Corvette DP of Eric Curran was fourth, with teammate Christian Fittipaldi completing the top-five overall and in the Prototype class.

Robert Alon claimed his second pole of the season in Prototype Challenge.

Alon’s 2:01.847 in the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Oreca FLM09 came on his final lap prior to a session-ending red flag with three minutes to go for Mark Kvamme, who beached his No. 88 Starworks Motorsport entry.

The No. 7 Starworks car of Jose Gutierrez qualified second in class, with teammate and class championship leader Alex Popow in third.

Matt McMurry (BAR1 Motorsports) and Nick Boulle (Performance Tech) completed the top-five in class.

The Lone Star Le Mans gets underway Saturday at 11:35 a.m. CT.

RESULTS: Qualifying

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