Free Practice 2 for the Fanatec GT World Challenge powered by AWS at VIRginia International Raceway ended with the #6 US Racetronics Mercedes-AMG GT3 of Steven Aghakhani and Loris Spinelli on top of the time sheets.
The oppressive heat was on tap for the drivers, teams, and spectators in attendance. Ambient temperatures exceeded 37°C at points in the session, and track temperatures were well over 50°C.
The session was interrupted after the first ten minutes for debris at the Roller Coaster in turn 14, but the rest of the session resumed without any further interruptions.
Ryan Dalziel in the #13 Triarsi Competizione Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo had the fastest time early on, with a 1’44.871. He was surpassed by his fellow Champ Car World Series alumnus Jan Heylen, who took the #45 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3-R to the top on a 1’44.421.
Then with 20 minutes left in the session, Spinelli popped to the top on a 1’44.019, and improved to a 1’43.809 on his next lap. That time was the quickest of the day, surpassing the 1’43.837 set by the #38 ST Racing BMW M4 GT3 of Nick Wittmer (with Samantha Tan) in the first practice this morning.
Spinelli’s lap was also the best in the Pro Cup class by nearly a second and a half over the #3 K-PAX Lamborghini Huracan GT3 (Misha Goikhberg/Jordan Pepper), and the #1 K-PAX Lamborghini (Michele Beretta/Andrea Caldarelli), who finished eighth and ninth overall in the session respectively.
Colin Braun took the #04 CrowdStrike Racing by Riley Motorsports AMG GT3 up to second place at the end of the session with a 1’44.300, the fastest of the Pro/Am cars. This follows co-driver George Kurtz’s perfect form in GT America practices after Kurtz led both FP1 and FP2 in the sprint series.
Second in Pro-Am and third overall was the #45 Wright Porsche of Heylen (fresh from his debut outing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans with his old GT World Challenge running mate Fred Poordad) and Charlie Luck, a native of Richmond, Virginia marking his first GT World Challenge outing at his home track.
The #13 Triarsi Ferrari of Dalziel and Justin Wetherill was just behind them in fourth overall, followed by the #93 Racers Edge Motorsports Acura NSX GT3 Evo22 (Ashton Harrison/Mario Farnbacher), the Virginia-based #94 BimmerWorld M4 GT3 (Chandler Hull/Bill Auberlen), and the #63 DXDT Racing AMG GT3 (David Askew/Dirk Mueller), one of two cars from the team based just 130 miles southwest in Statesville, North Carolina. The other DXDT Mercedes, the #08 (Scott Smithson/Bryan Sellers), was tenth overall.
Another 2022 Le Mans debutant, Conrad Grunewald, took the #61 AF Corse Ferrari which he shares with Jean-Claude Saada to the top of the two-car Am Cup battle, finishing 13th overall.
Two cars did not turn a representative lap in this session: The #91 Zelus Motorsports Lamborghini (Jeff Burton/Corey Lewis) was reported stopped on track during the session once again, as was the case in FP1. The #96 Turner Motorsport M4 (Michael Dinan/Robby Foley) did a total of three non-representative laps across both practices.
All 19 cars were able to take to the track today. The #88 Zelus Motorsports Lamborghini (Jason Harward/Madison Snow) got out on track in Practice 2 after missing Practice 1. But the #43 RealTime Racing NSX (Erin Vogel/Michael Cooper) did not take part in Practice 2 after running in Practice 1.
The RealTime NSX had suffered an electrical issue which kept them in their garage.
Images © Brian Cleary / SRO Motorsports Group America
