On a beautiful Thursday night in Georgia, the pink #01 Cadillac Racing V-Series.R led the way in Practice 3 for the 27th annual Motul Petit Le Mans.
For the fans, Practice 3 gave them a chance to see and hear the cars in their element under a clear night sky. For the drivers, it was about acclimating to night-time, multi-class driving.
Renger van der Zande was the fastest man on track in the #01 Cadillac, reeling off a best time of 1:11.626 to lead GTP, after a long red flag for an incident between the #3 Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R and the #78 Forte Racing Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO2.
With Loris Spinelli leaving the pits on cold tyres, he tried to blend out onto the track – but all it took was a wiggle in the esses from Daniel Juncadella for the two GTs to come to blows. The right-rear suspension of the Corvette broke and Juncadella spun almost all the way down the hill, and Spinelli’s Lamborghini was stranded with minor damage.
Both drivers walked away from their vehicles unhurt.
Andrea Caldarelli was the quickest man in the #63 Lamborghini Iron Lynx SC63 again, this time it was good enough for second place.
The #63 Lamborghini was also involved in an incident that brought out the second red flag just minutes later. Romain Grosjean spun coming out of turn two and was left stranded past a completely blind crest. The Franco-Swiss driver remained still until the red flag was shown.
GTP Championship leader Felipe Nasr went third-fastest in the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963, ahead of the #24 Team RLL BMW M Hybrid V8 of Augusto Farfus in fourth, then the #6 Penske Porsche of Mathieu Jaminet in fifth.
In LMP2, United Autosports USA led the class as the purple #2 ORECA LMP2 07 of Ben Hanley turned in the fastest time (1:13.178).
He was followed by the leader in the LMP2 title race, Tom Dillmann in the #52 Inter Europol/PR1 Mathiasen ORECA. Behind Dillmann was Mikkel Jensen in the #11 TDS Racing ORECA.
The #74 Riley ORECA of Felipe Fraga was fourth-fastest but Fraga was also involved in a skirmish with the overall fastest man Van der Zande as the two disagreed with each other over a lack of racing room. The two cars touched down the front stretch but continued on after inspections in the pit lane revealed no significant damage to either, though
In addition, the #22 United Autosports ORECA received a 60-second stop in the penalty box after Paul di Resta reversed down pit lane.
The fastest GT car came from the GTD class as Robby Foley in the #96 Turner Motorsport BMW M4 GT3 led his class and all the GTD Pro runners.
Foley’s best lap of 1:19.195 was nearly a tenth up on the best GTD Pro time, set by the class’ championship leader Laurin Heinrich in the #77 AO Racing ‘Rexy’ Porsche 911 GT3 R (1:19.273).
The top four in GTD Pro also featured the #1 Paul Miller Racing BMW of Madison Snow in second, the #4 Pratt Miller Motorsports Corvette of Nicky Catsburg in third, and the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 of Ben Barnicoat in fourth.
Then in GTD, Simon Mann was a surprising second place in his #21 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3. Klaus Bachler was third-fastest in the #86 MDK Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R, and Scott Andrews took the #80 Lone Star Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 up to fourth.
Qualifying from Michelin Raceway Road Atlanta begins tomorrow at 3:25 PM EDT (local time).
Images © Jack Webster / Dailysportscar.com
