Elliott Skeer put the GTD-class No. 120 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R on top of the time sheets in the second practice for the Michelin GT Challenge at VIRginia International Raceway for the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. His 1m43.570s (113.66mph) was 0.008s better than the top GTD PRO runner, Alex Riberas in the No. 23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo.
“We’re feeling pretty good so far today,” said Skeer. “The Wright guys have given us an amazing car. Luckily, we’ve done some racing here recently, so that definitely helps keep me in tune, keep Adam [Adelson] in tune. So we’re coming in feeling pretty good and pretty fresh for the weekend.”
In a 1h45m session where teams were concentrating on long runs in order to find a way to manage the increased tire degradation they’re seeing this year, Skeer’s best was just shy of the best time of the weekend, set by Madison Snow in the Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 yesterday. The PMR team had some challenges in the session, and Snow’s partner Bryan Sellers ended up sixth in GTD PRO.
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Following Skeer in GTD, Loris Spinelli set the third-fastest-overall time in the No. 78 Forte Racing Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo2, a 1m43.682s. Korthoff Preston Motorsports found a lot of time in its No. 32 Mercedes AMG GT3, Kenton Koch posting a 1m44.193s lap good for third in GTD. Anders Fjordbach in the No. 86 MDK Motorsports Porsche and Zacharie Robichon in the No. 27 Heart of Racing Aston Martin rounded out the top five in GTD.
Jack Hawksworth put the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F GT3 second in GTD PRO and fourth overall, 0.179s off of Riberas’ best. Tommy Milner turned a lap in 1m43.900s to put the No. 4 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Z06 GT3.R in third.
Joey Hand made the No. 65 Ford Multimatic Motorsports Mustang GT3 look promising in fourth, with Klaus Bachler the best in the No. 77 AO Racing Porsche fifth in GTD PRO.
As with yesterday’s practice, the entire session went without a red flag, off-track excursions being the only incidents. Only Russell Ward saw any contact with a barrier in the No. 57 Winward Racing Mercedes AMG, but he was able to get it back to the pits.
When the 15m qualifying session takes place at 4:50pm ET this afternoon, times so far indicate that at least one lap record will fall. The top times in both practice sessions have bettered the existing GTD PRO record, although the GTD record of 1m43.356s has yet to be beaten. Both records are held by Heart of Racing’s Ross Gunn.
Qualifying will stream live on Peacock and on IMSA.tv.