Albuquerque Leads Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Front Row Sweep at Road America
(Photo credit: IMSA/Michael L. Levitt/LAT Images)
Unsure of how the latest Balance of Performance adjustments would impact his No. 10 Konica Minolta Acura ARX-06, Filipe Albuquerque led a front row sweep for Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti for Sunday’s two-hour, forty-minute IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race at Elkhart Lake’s Road America.
Albuquerque’s lap of one-minute, 48.601-seconds was good for his 15th career pole, and his first since the Detroit Grand Prix in 2023. Jordan Taylor put the No. 40 sister car on the outside of the front row.
“We were looking strong the whole weekend here now. Even if like in the beginning, the feeling was pretty bad, in a way off, like the track has just been slow to what you could do. We went like another one second and a half almost, or two seconds quicker at one point eight, I think, from free practice this morning. That shows that are far we were from the times.
“When I went out the car felt really really good. I find tweaking the car, front and rear and just like the right decisions, obviously, because we always know that the qualifying anyone can put a banger in, especially in such a long track. You have more time to make the difference. Like if you put the perfect lap in 14 corners, you can really make the difference. It's never easy and like when you're putting so much risks, you can lock and you can bail and then you miss the peak of the time.
“Regarding the 40 team, teamwork,” Albuquerque stated. “We seem a little bit stronger than them. But again, not much, but then we share data, we share impressions between the drivers and engineers. And we come together with a setup or closer. This represents the team work that we're doing and it makes sense.
“Two-tenths on a track with 14 corners. It's not much and I'm just happy that I came with a pole position. It's down to the ego. I always say that the front row is more than enough for a race for two hours and 40 minutes but on the ego side, on the hard season that me and (co-driver) Ricky (Taylor) been having, pole position is always good for that, so I'm just super happy about it. And again, it doesn't matter if it's not my first pole position, but I always enjoy it as as my personal.”
(Photo credit: IMSA/Michael L. Levitt/LAT Images)
Enjoy it, Albuquerque did, celebrating with Taylor and crew as if they had won the season championship.
“It doesn't matter how many races you win and championships or pole positions. I think we are in the sport because I love it and I'm in the sport to win it. And when I achieve that, you know, the road is long of suffering, of working, thinking many flights being away from the family. There is a lot of dedication. So when we achieve we need to enjoy life.
“I really feel like that we need to be happy with little wins. These little wins helps me to be more motivated for the next challenge and then life is better. I really feel like that. So means nothing? Maybe, but I'm just happy and that will carry on a smile through me through the day does not mean that I'm not going to be working tonight and going again because we lose much more than we win. So if we don't enjoy the small highs and the wins, life is just miserable. So I'm a happy person so I always like to see the positives on it.”
(Photo credit: IMSA/Richard Dole/LAT Images)
P.J. Hyett put the No. 99 AO Racing ORECA LMP2 07 on the LMP2 class pole with a lap of 1:53.738 for the fourth consecutive race this season.
“Road America is actually pretty special to us,” Hyett said, because it's effectively our home race for AO Racing. We're based in the Chicagoland area but even if it wasn't our home race, I absolutely love this race track.
“This is the first track that I ever drove a P2 car 12 months ago. So it's special on a number of levels. In fact, I was telling the NBC-TV folks that my grandfather taught me how to drive about 100 miles from here in the northern hills of Wisconsin so everything is special about what's happening today. And so for me to be able to put the car on pole here is really a dream come true. I absolutely love racing a P2 car and hope to keep doing it.”
(Photo credit: IMSA/Jake Galstad/LAT Images
Nicky Catsburg put the No. 4 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R on pole in GTD PRO. His lap of 2:02.198 was a new track record for the class, edging teammate Alexander Sims by .2-second.
“We have some good momentum going on with the team right now. Obviously, coming from a one, two qualifying in Canada and a race one, two. So, it's been going really well. We've gotten a car really dialed in and today before qualifying, we made some last minute setup changes and it worked really, really well for us. So super pleased with that.
“We have big backing here from Oshkosh, one of our main sponsors. They're all here. So it's good for us to put on a show and be P one and two. Great job by the whole team. And hopefully tomorrow we can repeat what we did in Canada, but I feel like it's gonna be more difficult.”
Photo credit: IMSA/Richard Dole/LAT Images)
In GTD, Canadian Mikael Grenier will start the Korthoff/Preston Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3 from pole.
“We've struggled a bit this year. Did a few mistake and I think this weekend, we've put a weekend together. (We’ll have) to see the race tomorrow because it's obviously quite a difference. We made some strategy mistake this year. So I fixed that. And we are a bit slow in the straights or I guess in traffic it might be difficult but we'll see tomorrow.”
Starting in front of the rest of the class will be good according to Grenier.
“I think track position will be really important for us. Try to stay in the front, have good pitstops, have good strategy, because I think to overtake, for everyone to overtake, it’s not that easy. But I think for us it would be very tricky. But if we have a good car long run, we should be hopefully fine to keep track position and my teammate (Kenton Koch) is doing very good job this weekend. So hopefully we can bring it home,”