Sargent Tops Opening Sonoma Practice in GMG Porsche

Photo: Fabian Lagunas/SRO

Tom Sargent led the way in the first GT World Challenge America powered by AWS practice session of the season at Sonoma Raceway, putting the GMG Racing’s Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo atop the time sheets.

Sargent, a Porsche Motorsport North America Selected Driver, reeled off a best time of 1:34.023 in the hour-long session on Friday afternoon, edging out the No. 017 Kellymoss Porsche of Colin Braun by 0.120 seconds.

The top spot changed at least four times in the final ten minutes, with Aaron Telitz having also briefly held the quickest time in his Archangel Motorsports McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, which ended up fourth, behind a last-lap flyer from Frederik Schandorff in the No. 13 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo, who ended up third and quickest of the Pro class entries.

Riley Dickinson made it three Porsches in the top-five in his No. 13 Kellymoss Porsche.

Cameron Lawrence ended up sixth after leading the majority of the session overall in his Dollahite Racing Ford Mustang GT3 EVO.

Ryan Yardley was seventh quickest in the No. 31 Wright Motorsports Porsche, ahead of Will Bamber’s TR3 Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo and the No. 34 JMF Racing Mercedes-AMG of Michai Stevens.

The No. 163 AF Corse Ferrari of Ozz Negri, the lone Am class entrant, completed the overall top ten.

The session ran relatively clean other than for an incident involving the No. 31 Wright Motorsports Porsche of Dave Musial Jr. and Jan Heylen’s No. 28 RS1 Porsche while entering pit lane.

Musial Jr. slowed on the entry, leading to Heylen making contact with the tire barriers, and ultimately bringing out a red flag due for barrier repairs.

The Wright driver was assessed a stop-and-hold plus five-minute penalty for incident responsibility.

Practice 2 is scheduled for Saturday at 11 a.m. PST (2 p.m. EST).

RESULTS: Practice 1

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