Fittingly for the team carrying sponsorship for the new film Justin Wilson showed a Need For Speed in the second practice session for the Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring, leading the field in the Riley-Ford entered by Michael Shank Racing with Curb/Agajanian.
The Briton followed up Scott Dixon, who led the opening practice in another EcoBoost powered Riley.
While Wilson set the pace with a best lap of 1:53.621 – more than a second slower than Dixon’s earlier time – the #02 Chip Ganassi Racing entry of Dixon, Tony Kanaan and Sage Karam were fourth fastest, more than a second behind.
Max Angelelli was second fastest in the session, three tenths behind in the Wayne Taylor Racing Chevrolet Corvette DP he shares with brothers Ricky and Jordan Taylor. Klaus Graf was third fastest in the Muscle Milk Pickett Racing entry co-driven by Lucas Luhr and Jann Mardenborough.
Spirit of Daytona Racing completed the top five in the session.
14th overall David Ostella was fastest in LMPC in the Performance Tech Motorsports car he will share with Charlie Shears and Rafael Matos.
The spec class was also responsible for one of the red flags that came out during the session, the #87 car fielded by BAR1 Motorsports crashing and needing recovery – specifically by a fork-lift truck – during the session. After the opening session had run red flag free the second session was interrupted several times, and ended fractionally early after John Pew spun and stalled the Michael Shank Racing car at the final corner in the closing minutes.
After half a second split first and second in GT Le Mans in the first session the class was back to its normal tightly packed ways. Patrick Long was fastest in the #912 Porsche North America entry, but five other teams – both Corvette Racing C7.R, Team Falken Tire’s Porsche, BMW Team RLL’s #55 and the Risi Competizione Ferrari were all bunched into the same second of lap time behind Long’s 2:00.289.
The Rum Bum Racing/Snow Racing Porsche was the best of the GT Daytona class courtesy of a lap of 2:04.307 posted by Jan Heylen. Andy Lally was second fastest for Magnus Racing as Porsche GT America somewhat dominated the category in the session, taking out five of the top six spots the intruder the Riley Motorsports SRT Viper third fastest in class.
The TRG–AMR #007 that had led the first session was only 13th fastest in class, a shade over two seconds slower than Heylen’s time.
A 90 minute night practice session follows to conclude Thursday’s Sebring running. A final practice scheduled for Friday before qualifying begins at 4:10pm local time (8:10pm UK).
