Ellis, Bell Claim Road America Poles

Photo: Fabian Lagunas/SRO

Philip Ellis scored his fourth consecutive GT World Challenge America powered by AWS pole position, taking top qualifying honors for Race 1 at Road America, with Matt Bell claiming pole for Sunday’s round.

Ellis, in the No. 91 Regulator Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, reeled off a chart-topping 2:03.777 lap time in his Pro-Am class entry to edge out the Pro category pole-sitting No. 34 JMF Motorsports Mercedes-AMG of Michai Stephens by 0.431 seconds.

The No. 18 RS1 Porsche 911 GT3 R of Alex Sedgwick will start Race 1 third overall, followed by the championship-leading No. 99 Random Vandals Racing BMW M4 GT3 EVO of Kenton Koch and Justin Rothberg of Turner Motorsport, who completed the overall top-five.

Blake McDonald will start third in Pro-Am in the No. 11 DXDT Racing Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R, qualifying seventh overall, behind the Pro class No. 51 Random Vandals BMW of Varun Choksey.

Am class pole honors went to the No. 6 Dollahite Racing Ford Mustang GT3 of Scott Dollahite, while a brake issue prevented the car from taking part in Q2, handing top class qualifying honors for Race 2 to the No. 163 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 of Ozz Negri.

Dollahite, however, will have a loss of three starting grid positions for causing a collision with the No. 88 Archangel Motorsports McLaren 720S GT3 Evo of Todd Coleman in Q1.

Q2 saw Bell, in the No. 11 DXDT Corvette, set a benchmark 2:03.527 to edge out the No. 34 JMF Mercedes-AMG of Mikael Grenier by three-tenths.

The No. 88 Archangel McLaren of Aaron Telitz will start third for Race 2, with Tom Sargent and Robby Foley completing the overall top-five for GMG Racing and Turner, respectively.

Pro class championship leader Connor De Phillippi, meanwhile, qualified eighth overall.

The first 90-minute race of the weekend gets underway at 3:15 p.m. CST with live coverage on SRO’s GT World YouTube channel, as well as Twitch and on RACER Network.

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