JCD, Cowden Claim Poles in Mixed-Condition Qualifying

Photo: Fred Hardy/SRO

John Capestro-Dubets and Jake Cowden have secured pole positions for this weekend’s Pirelli GT4 America rounds at Virginia International Raceway following a mixed-condition pair of qualifying sessions.

Capestro-Dubets kept his No. 28 RS1 Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 RS Clubsport on track to complete a session-best time of 2:06.182 in his Silver class entry while on a wet 3.27-mile circuit.

It was 0.678 seconds quicker than Cowden, who is set to drive solo this weekend in the No. 34 JMF Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT4 entry.

John Geesbreght qualified third in the No. 68 Smooge Racing Toyota GR Supra GT4 EVO, while Colin Garrett and Kevin Boehm completed the overall top-five in their AutoTechnic Racing and Random Vandals Racing BMWs, respectively.

The Am class No. 36 BimmerWorld BMW M4 GT4 of James Clay out-qualified the entire Pro-Am field, which was led by the No. 43 P1 Groupe Mercedes-AMG of Matt Bell, who had a session-ending accident.

The red flag was displayed with less than two minutes left on the clock due to Bell’s contact with the tire barriers.

It came after a number of other spins during the challenging conditions, including incidents for Daniel Hanley and Hannah Greenemeier in the Hanley Motorsports Toyota and Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage GT4, respectively.

Hanley, meanwhile, had a second incident that damaged the nose of his Toyota.

Q2 brought drier conditions and significantly faster lap times, with Cowden having reeled off a 1:53.787 to take overall and Silver class pole for Race 2.

His time was 0.218 seconds quicker than the Pro-Am class No. 89 RENNtech Motorsports Mercedes-AMG of Matheus Leist, with RS1’s Eric Filgueiras in third.

Tyler Gonzalez and Zac Anderson completed the overall top-five for Smooge Racing and AutoTechnic, respectively.

Am class pole honors for Race 2 went to the No. 099 Rotek Racing Porsche of Jaden Lander.

Race 1 gets underway at 5 p.m. EDT with live coverage on SRO’s GT World YouTube channel and on Twitch.

RESULTS: Qualifying 1/Qualifying 2

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