Parente Puts K-PAX On Top in COTA Opening Practice

Alvaro Parente led the first of two practice sessions for this weekend’s Blancpain GT World Challenge America season-opener at Circuit of the Americas.

The K-PAX Racing driver turned in a time of 2:06.001 in the second half of the Friday lunchtime session to put the second-gen Bentley Continental GT3 on top.

Parente, who is sharing the No. 9 Bentley with Andy Soucek, ended up 0.048 seconds clear of Daniel Morad in the No. 22 Alegra Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R.

Porsche entries occupied the second, third and fourth-place slots on the timing sheets, with Dennis Olsen running just 0.093 off the pace in third for Pro-Am squad Wright Motorsports.

The Porsche factory junior was followed by Marco Holzer in the sister Alegra car, while the best of the Mercedes-AMG GT3 entries rounded out the top five.

This P1 Motorsports car was driven by Maximilian Buhk, who was marginally quicker than the second Bentley with Rodgrigo Baptista at the helm.

The top 10 cars all fell within a second of Parente’s overall lead time, with the 2018 championship-winning R.Ferri Motorsport Ferrari 488 GT3 the last of those entries.

Fastest in the Am class was Anthony Lazzaro who registered a time of 2:07433 in the Ferrari entered by Risi Competizione.

RESULTS: Practice 1