The curtain closed on the Roar Before The 24 with a bang. Pipo Derani, the reigning IMSA GTP Series Champion, and the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac V-Series.R obliterated the Daytona International Speedway qualifying lap record to win the pole for the 62nd annual Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona.
A record-breaking Sunday afternoon of qualifying was foretold when Sebastian Bourdais unofficially broke the Daytona sports car course record in Test Session 6 – setting a 1:33.236 to lead the way.
And with less than five minutes to go, the fiery Brazilian and his red Cadillac broke new ground, clocking in with a time of 1:32.656, at an average speed of 222.311 kilometres per hour.
This was over a second faster than the previous qualifying record, set by Oliver Jarvis in 2019 aboard the Mazda RT-24P, who set a 1:33.685 to win the pole for Mazda Team Joest in 2019. In fact, all nine GTP cars and drivers who participated broke that benchmark.
And it was seven-tenths clear of Jarvis’ 1:33.398 set in the preceding Roar Before The 24, which broke PJ Jones’ 1:33.875 set in 1993 aboard the Toyota-Eagle Mk.III. The top seven in GTP also eclipsed that time – and the top five beat the 1:33.323 set by Olivier Pla during the 2020 Roar, also in the Mazda.
Bourdais in the gold #01 Cadillac entered by Chip Ganassi Racing missed out on the pole and the new lap record by 0.071 seconds, but secured an all-Cadillac front row for next weekend’s Daytona 24 Hours.
Behind them, the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963 qualified third courtesy of Felipe Nasr.
Connor De Phillippi was fourth-fastest in the #25 BMW M Hybrid V8 entered by Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing.
Rounding out the top five was Louis Deletraz in the red and black #40 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Acura ARX-06, ahead of his team-mate Filipe Albuquerque in the black and blue #10 WTRAndretti Acura.
Nick Tandy was seventh in the #6 Penske Porsche, followed by BMW GTP newcomer Jesse Krohn in the #24. Tijmen van der Helm was ninth in the #85 JDC-Miller MotorSports Porsche, eight-tenths off of pole.
But if you’re wondering what happened to the #5 Proton Competition Porsche, it didn’t emerge. Neel Jani lost control heading into the West Horseshoe (turn five) during the GTP Test Session 6, and hit the armco barriers, damaging the front and rear of the car. The black and gold Porsche did not set a time and will start tenth next week.
In the first race of United Autosports’ new full-time adventure in the United States, none other than the familiar hand of Ben Keating guided their purple #2 Oreca 07-Gibson to pole position in LMP2.
Keating extends a personal streak of five consecutive LMP2 pole positions, which began in 2020 – and tied Tandy’s record for the most poles in Rolex 24 history. His pole-winning time of 1:38.501 was not a new LMP2 qualifying record by any means, but he was two seconds better than his pole-winning time last year – as the top nine gentleman drivers surpassed the 2023 pole time.
He had a close call at the Le Mans Chicane late in the 15-minute session – but Keating was again the class of his gentleman driver peers in this time trial.
Keating’s former team, PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports – now aligned with Inter Europol Competition – will start second in LMP2 as Nick Boulle came within a tenth of surpassing Keating. Boulle and the green and yellow #52 Oreca had a chance to take pole at the chequered flag, but could not complete his best time despite strong first and second sectors.
Behind them, defending Jim Trueman Award winner George Kurtz was third in the #04 CrowdStrike by APR Oreca, with final LMP3 champion Gar Robinson not far back in the #74 Riley Oreca.
The sole Ligier JS P217 in the field, the #33 of Sean Creech Motorsport, qualified 12th out of 13 in the hands of Lance Willsey.
AF Corse’s Luis Perez Companc locked up into the West Horseshoe (turn five), spun, and hit the tyre barriers – but was able to pull his damaged #88 Oreca to a safe area and keep his times for tenth in class.
But qualifying in GTD Pro and GTD didn’t start well at all for David Brule and KellyMoss with Riley. Brule lost control of the #92 Porsche GT3 and hit head-on into the armco barrier at the International Horseshoe (turn three), on his out-lap. Brule was uninjured, but the same couldn’t be said of the damaged KellyMoss/Riley Porsche.
After a 12-minute red flag and a clock reset, GTD combined qualifying turned into an eight-minute dash for the cash. To cap off a record-breaking day, it was Seb Priaulx in “Rexy the GT3 Rawr” – the #77 AO Racing Porsche GT3 – who took the GTD Pro pole position in the final seconds. He did it with a new outright GT3 (and GTD Pro class) lap record, of 1:44.382.
Priaulx and Rexy broke the lap record previously set by Marcos Gomes in 2019, which was 1:44.541.
Defending GTD Pro Series Champion Jack Hawksworth was less than a tenth away in the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3, in second place.
From there it was a four-tenths margin to Antonio Garcia in the #3 Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R, who was third in GTD Pro but will line up ninth on the combined GTD grid. Franck Perera qualified fourth in the #19 Iron Lynx Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO2.
The GTD pole position went to Vasser Sullivan’s new full-timer, Parker Thompson, in the #12 Lexus. Thompson’s time of 1:44.494 was set right at the chequered flag and will go down as a GTD class lap record.
Klaus Bachler fell just short, finishing second in the #86 MDK Motorsports Porsche, by 0.043 seconds. Katherine Legge put in a solid effort for third in the #66 Gradient Racing Acura NSX GT3 Evo22, ahead of Kyle Marcelli, fourth-quickest in the #45 WTRAndretti Lamborghini.
Images © Jake Galstad / IMSA
