Pipo Derani and Action Express Racing’s reign as the masters of Sebring International Raceway continued after a disrupted qualifying session for the 72nd Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring.
Derani, Action Express, and Cadillac won their second straight pole – and third pole for the Sebring 12H in the last four years, but much of the 15-minute GTP qualifying session was thrown out of balance after Mathieu Jaminet’s crash in the #6 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963.
Jaminet clipped too much of the dirt on the exit of turn one, which caused his car to snap to the right and hit the wall head-on. While the Frenchman was able to walk away from the impact with the armco barrier, his car was too damaged to continue, and the #6 Penske Porsche will start the race from the rear of the GTP grid.
The remaining ten drivers only had a few minutes after the red flag was lifted to set a fast time. Ultimately the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac V-Series.R, as it did last year, won the pole with a best time of 1:48.152. It was over two seconds slower than what he produced in this same car last year, but still good enough for the pole.
About the difficult qualifying session, Derani said, ” It’s never easy when you have a red flag situation and you have to put the lap in. I was told over the radio that I could potentially have a second flying lap if I pushed. So, I obviously pushed but I was way too close for comfort to the #40 Acura.
“I was able to put the lap in but was a little bit disrupted because it wasn’t such a clean lap because he made a few mistakes in front of me, so I lost a little bit of time trying to control that distance to make sure I guaranteed a lap in case I didn’t have a second one. For sure, there’s more from the lap time. It wasn’t a perfect lap because of those things I said.
“Nevertheless, it was enough to be on pole. It’s never the nicest way to get a pole, for the grid, when you know that no one was able to achieve the full potential of their cars. Nevertheless, it’s still the same for everyone. You still have to put a lap in. You make no mistakes in such a pressure situation.
“I was able to extract to a certain extent enough out of the car that was good enough for pole. Very hot conditions, which makes it even more interesting how you operate the tires. It’s a tricky situation.”
It’s Derani’s 11th career pole position and second in the 2024 season.
It’ll be an all-Cadillac front row with Sebastien Bourdais in second aboard the gold-fronted #01 Cadillac run by Chip Ganassi Racing, who was just 0.147s behind Derani’s time.
Louis Deletraz qualified third-fastest in the #40 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Acura ARX-06, but WTRAndretti could have had an even better result in qualifying at the end.
Ricky Taylor lost all his times in the #10 WTRAndretti Acura after the team was working on the car during qualifying – including a 1:48.038 which would have won the pole ahead of Derani!
Philipp Eng qualified fourth in the #24 BMW M Hybrid V8, followed by Phil Hanson, in the #85 JDC-Miller MotorSports Porsche – which out-qualified the other Porsches!
Matteo Cairoli in the debuting #63 Lamborghini Iron Lynx SC63 could only manage a 1:53.374 but it will still be good enough for ninth place on the GTP grid tomorrow.
LMP2 produced a pleasant surprise at the top – a purple ORECA 07-Gibson did take the pole position, but this time it was the #99 AO Racing car driven by PJ Hyett!
Hyett, in just his fifth weekend of LMP2 racing across the Asian Le Mans Series and IMSA, took pole position in his class with a best lap of 1:52.142 – his first career IMSA pole position, ahead of some of the best Bronzes in the sport.
The two United Autosports USA cars qualified second and third, with the blue and red #22 of Daniel Goldburg in second, and the purple #2 of Ben Keating in third. Keating had a half-spin at turn three which may have impacted his push for pole position, but he’ll still start near the front.
Nick Boulle was fourth-fastest in the #52 Inter Europol by PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA, while Dwight Merriman and Era Motorsport only timed in 11th in the Daytona-winning #18 ORECA.
However, Dennis Andersen brought out a red flag in the final minute when his car spun and stopped at the Hairpin (turn seven), which will result in the loss of his two best laps and promote Merriman to tenth. The #20 MDK by High Class Racing ORECA will only drop to 11th, though, even after the loss of Andersen’s best laps.
Lance Willsey in the #33 Sean Creech Motorsports Ligier JS P217 was five seconds off the pole time in 13th.
Records were also broken in GTD Pro, where Jack Hawksworth in the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3, also in a special gold 50th-anniversary livery, won the pole position.
Hawksworth broke the one-minute 59-second barrier in IMSA GTD qualifying, and even beat his own lap record set in 2021, a 1:59.247 – which has now been surpassed with his time of 1:58.714.
That was good enough for Hawksworth’s 12th career IMSA pole position.
Within their respective classes, the #23 Heart of Racing Team Aston Martin Vantage GT3 of Mario Farnbacher was second in GTD Pro, half a second back of Hawksworth’s best time.
Daytona polesitter Seb Priaulx was third in GTD Pro aboard the #77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R.
Philip Ellis had initially won the pole position in GTD with a time of 1:58.778, which would have been a class course record.
But, after qualifying, the Daytona-winning #57 Mercedes-AMG GT3 was found to have non-permitted sensors installed – resulting in the loss of all of Ellis’ lap times.
Instead, Antonio Fuoco, who looked to be the favourite for pole position early on – and the #47 Cetilar Racing Ferrari 296 GT3, inherits the pole position in GTD with his best time of 1:59.014, which ends up being the new GTD course record anyway.
Fuoco will start on the front row of the combined GTD grid with the #14 Lexus of Hawksworth. Lining up behind them are Daytona GTD pole-winner Parker Thompson in the #12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus, who qualified second in class; Mikaël Grenier was third in the #32 Korthoff Preston Motorsports Mercedes, followed by Loris Spinelli in the #78 Forte Racing Lamborghini.
Only Sarah Bovy failed to set a representative time aboard her #83 Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO2, after she suffered a puncture on her out lap. She’ll start from the rear of the field with 12 hours of racing ahead of the Dames to make up the deficit.
UPDATE: All four Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs have been sent to the rear of the field for unapproved changes to homologated parts.
The 72nd annual 12 Hours of Sebring starts tomorrow morning at 9:40 EDT (local time).
Images © Jack Webster / Dailysportscar.com
