Ross Gunn and the No. 23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin will start the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Series Championship at Lime Rock Park from pole position after the Briton bested the rest of the GT Daytona Pro field by nearly two-tenths of a second. It was a remarkable performance by the Aston Martin factory driver and puts Heart of Racing in its best position this season to secure a win on the difficult-to-pass bull ring.
The honors in looked destined to be headed the way of Antonio Garcia, who carried over his free practice pace into the qualifying session. Garcia was the quickest GTD Pro driver from the moment the session went green, besting his own time on a number of occasions.
With the Aston Martin’s tires up to temperature, Gunn laid down a record-setting 50.593s to leapfrog the Corvette. Jack Hawksworth soon followed suit in the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC-F GT3 with a time of 50.784s to move onto the front row, relegating the No. 3 Corvette to the second row of the grid.
Jules Gounon’s No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 was fourth and Patrick Pilet in the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R was fifth.
In GT Daytona, Mike Skeen in the No. 32 Team Korthoff Motorsports Mercedes-AMG secured pole with a time of 51.517s, an astounding 0.007s ahead Frederik Schandorff in the No. 70 Inception Racing McLaren 720s GT3. Misha Goikhberg’s No. 78 Forte Racing powered by USRT Lamborghini Huracan GT3 rounded out the top three in GTD.
UP NEXT: Saturday’s 100-minute race is slated for 4:15pm ET. It will air on the USA Network.