Noaker Quickest in Practice 1 at Charlotte Roval

Robert Noaker led the way in the first Mustang Challenge practice session of the weekend at the Charlotte Motor Speedway Roval to kick off the IMSA single-make series’ final event of the year.

Having already clinched the Dark Horse drivers’ title at Circuit of The Americas, the Robert Noaker Racing frontman jumped to the top of the times early in his No. 13 Ford Mustang Dark Horse R before continuing to improve on his time throughout the 30-minute session, ultimately laying down a 1:28.210 benchmark lap on his seventh of 13 total trips around the 17-turn road course.

Fellow Ford Racing Junior Team driver Sam Paley was second-quickest in Practice 1, putting his No. 26 Mustang 1.2 seconds off of Noaker’s pace.

Sandy Satullo put a second RNR Mustang inside the top three times, with his best lap seeing him finish first practice in third ahead of Peterson Racing Group’s Rafa Matos in fourth.

Dark Horse Legends class title contender Alex Bachoura was fifth fastest overall in the No. 33 Spark Performance machine to lead the class times by over half a second, with title rival Alfonso Diaz finishing Practice 1 as the 12th-quickest driver in the session.

Fifteen-time SCCA champion Andrew Aquilante turned his first official practice laps in Dark Horse R machinery on Friday morning, putting his RNR Ford sixth quickest overall and fifth-best amongst Dark Horse competitors in the session on his debut weekend.

The session ran green from start to finish, with all 20 drivers in attendance turning laps and locking in representative times.

Practice 2 is scheduled for 1:45 p.m. EST on Friday, ahead of qualifying later in the evening to set the grid for tomorrow’s pair of races.

RESULTS: Practice 1