Sebring First Hour Under Yellow Following Fire

An ignited fire left the 62nd Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring under yellow at the one-hour mark, with Andy Meyrick leading overall and in the Prototype class in the No. 0 DeltaWing DWC13 coupe.

Meyrick, who co-drives with Katherine Legge and Gabby Chaves, opted not to pit on the first yellow flag while the rest of the leaders did.

Under that yellow, which waved around the 20-minute mark for David Cheng’s stalled No. 8 Starworks Motorsport Oreca FLM09 PC car on the inside of Turn 5, Ben Keating stopped his No. 33 Riley Motorsports SRT Viper GT3-R on track just past that, at the right-handed Turn 6 kink.

Keating’s Viper began to blaze underneath the chassis, and he escaped out of the car under his own power before the car suffered further damage. The fire extended what was already bordering on a 20-minute long yellow flag period.

Prior to the caution, the polesitting No. 5 Action Express Racing Corvette DP led overall from pole in the hands of Joao Barbosa. Ricky Taylor jumped to second in the No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Corvette DP ahead of Olivier Pla in the No. 42 OAK Racing Morgan Nissan.

In PC, polesitter Bruno Junqueira led in the No. 09 RSR Racing Oreca FLM09. Fellow class polesitter, the No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR now started by Patrick Long, led in GTLM until the caution.

James Davison moved into the lead early in GTD in the No. 07 TRG-AMR Aston Martin Vantage, taking over from new class polesitter Leh Keen in the No. 22 Alex Job Racing Porsche 911 GT America.

Keen inherited the pole after the polesitting No. 94 Turner Motorsport BMW Z4 GT3 started from the rear due to an unspecified issue, and later had a drive-through penalty assessed.

Other class leaders at the one-hour mark besides Meyrick (P) and Junqueira (PC) were Kuba Giermaziak (No. 30 MOMO NGT Motorsport Porsche 911 GT America, GTD) and Kuno Wittmer (No. 93 SRT Motorsport SRT Viper GTS-R, GTLM).