Tower Sweeps CTMP Practice, Van der Zande Fastest

Renger van der Zande once again topped the times in the second and final practice session of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s Chevrolet Grand Prix weekend at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park ahead of qualifying on Saturday.

The Tower Motorsports driver laid down a 1:08.175 benchmark time in the No. 8 Oreca 07 Gibson he shares with John Farano this weekend and jumped to the top of the times on his 15th of the team’s 54 total practice laps.

Van der Zande’s time-topping lap was enough to outpace Daniel Goldburg and Tom Blomqvist’s No. 22 United Autosports machine by 0.325 seconds, with Felipe Fraga going third-quickest in his Riley Oreca, 0.337 seconds off of Tower’s pace.

Inter Europol Competition’s Tom Dillmann was fourth-quickest overall in the No. 43 entry he shares with Jeremy Clarke, while Dane Cameron completed the overall top five in the No. 99 AO Racing machine he co-drives with PJ Hyett.

After repairs following an accident that brought out a red flag in Friday’s Practice 1, TDS Racing turned 56 total laps and finished sixth-fastest in Saturday’s practice session with Hunter McElrea at the wheel.

Vasser Sullivan topped both the GTD Pro and GTD times with Aaron Telitz propelling his and Ben Barnicoat’s No. 14 Lexus RC F GT3 to the top of the all-pro production based class times. The American driver’s 1:15.270-second lap proved just 0.322 seconds faster than Tommy Milner’s best effort in the No. 4 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Z06 GT3.R.

Just prior to the session’s red flag interruption, Robert Wicken had set the quickest GTD class time aboard his No. 36 DXDT Racing Corvette before a late improvement from Jack Hawksworth in the final minutes put the No. 12 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F GT3 to the top of the GTD order and third quickest of all GT competitors.

An impact at Turn 9 for Casper Stevenson brought out the red flag roughly halfway into the 90-minute session. The accident, caused apparent damage to the front left of the No. 27 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo, only interrupted practice running for nine minutes before the session resumed.

Stevenson was cleared and released from the infield care center, though the team will lose their fastest qualifying time this afternoon for causing the stoppage.

Separately, an on-track incident involving the No. 77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R of Lauren Heinrich and the No. 13 GTD class AWA Racing Corvette of Orey Fidani came under review from race control after the reigning GTD Pro class champion nudged the rear of the 2024 Bob Aitken award winner’s Corvette. However, race stewards determined that no action was necessary.

Hyett also spun and continued at Turn 5 avoiding any major incident in his AO Racing machine.

Gradient Racing suffered a transponder issue during the session, which kept their No. 66 Ford Mustang GT3 in the pit lane and eventually behind the wall, having completed only 29 laps.

Qualifying to set the grid for the Chevrolet Grand Prix is scheduled for 4 p.m. EST with live streaming coverage available on Peacock and commentary on IMSA Radio.

RESULTS: Practice 2