Richard Westbrook and Spirit of Daytona scored Prototype pole at Detroit with Flying Lizards Motorsport scoring GT Daytona pole at the hands of Spencer Pumpelly.
As the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship qualifying got underway, it was clear to see that Prototype qualifying would be a close run affair and that quickly proved to be true.
The 15 minute session saw seven lead changes, Westbrook claimed three of those in his Corvette DP and managed to be in top spot when the musical chairs stopped.
Westbrook scored a time of 1:25.011 to shut out Ryan Dalziel who was just two hundredths of a second slower showing that, even with initial jitters, P2 cars are well balanced to the DPs.
Back in third, and at one point on pole, is Christian Fittipaldi in the Action Express Racing DP who himself was only one tenth off Westbrook.
On GTD pole, and hoping to avenge a Laguna Seca race that saw them run out fuel coming onto the start/finish straight on the last lap, is Pumpelly in the #45 Audi R8 LMS.
Setting a time of 1:32.914 the Lizards managed to set the time that mattered as the pole for this session to was changed 10 times, with Leh Keen holding pole for Alex Job Racing with five minutes left to go before Alessandro Balzan put the Scuderia Corsa on pole albeit temporarily.
“We had high hopes this weekend, coming here: doing well, getting the pole, winning the race,” said Pumpelly, who co-drives with Nelson Canache Jr. “We just have to get that chip off our shoulder tomorrow and finally come through with, not an almost, but a ‘did.’”
