After being pipped to second in opening practice on Friday, Connor De Phillippi rose to the top of the timesheets for the second 90-minute practice session for the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s Sportscar Weekend at Road America.
The #25 BMW M Hybrid V8 driver posted a 1:50.335 benchmark, just nine-thousandths of a second quicker than Filipe Albuquerque, who topped opening practice in the #10 Acura ARX-06.
It was a WTR Andretti Acura two-three as Jordan Taylor went third in the #40 ARX-06, 0.285 off of the ultimate pace.
BMW’s pace at Road America was confirmed with Jesse Krohn posting the fourth fastest effort in the #24 M Hybrid V8, a 1:51.036 with Proton Competition’s Gianmaria Bruni going fifth fastest in the #5 Porsche 963 (1:51.209).
Bruni led the factory Penske-run #7 Porsche of Felipe Nasr (1:51.248) with Cadillac’s Renger van der Zande going seventh quickest in the #01 V-Series.R (1:51.277), bettering the Whelen Engineering #31 Caddy of Pipo Derani in eighth (1:51.337).
A red flag was brought out with minutes to spare as Ben Keating crashed at Turn 10 in the #2 United Autosports Oreca 07 Gibson LMP2 machine, but the American’s co-driver Ben Hanley had already posted the fastest time in class, a 1:53.479.
The United Autosports crew will now have to work hard to get the #2 car in racing condition ahead of qualifying after Keating’s crash saw heavy damage to the left-hand side of the Oreca machine.
Hanley’s effort was 0.053s faster than that of Tom Dillmann in the #52 Inter Europol entry with Paul di Resta going third quickest in the sister #22 United Autosports machine (1:53.575).
Three GTD Pro cars led the way in the GT contingent of the 47-stong field of cars with Jack Hawksworth taking top spot in the #14 VasserSullivan Lexus RC F GT3 (2:03.475).
Alexander Sims was second quickest in the #3 Corvette Racing Z06 GT3.R (2:03.615) with Madison Snow third in class at the wheel of the #1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 (2:03.648).
Behind the leading trio of GTD Pro entrants was the two quickest GTD cars, namely the #78 Forte Racing Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 of Loris Spinelli (2:03.804) and the #023 Triarsi Competizione Ferrari 296 GT3 of Onofrio Triarsi (2:04.053).
