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Practice 2 was this morning and again the Meyer Shank Team was quickest although this time Ricky Taylor shot up to 2nd to complete the Acura sweep of the front row.
Seeing the gaps narrowing between the first two practices.
P1 Mazda ran a 1:32.483 which was about 1.42 seconds behind the Acura. Their Top speed was 132.348 vs Acura's of 134.422 . (+2.17mph)
P2 Mazda picked up the pace at 1:31.211 and Acura improved down to 1:30.451. Now only .76 seconds off the pace. Top speeds narrowed a bit as well but still about 1.26mph difference.
Taylor Leads Acura Front Row Sweep at Watkins Glen
WTR’s Ricky Taylor takes pole for Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen…
Ricky Taylor has led an Acura ARX-05 front row qualifying sweep for Sunday’s Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen.
The Wayne Taylor Racing driver reeled off a 1:30.022 lap time to edge out the No. 60 Meyer Shank Racing Acura DPi of Dane Cameron by 0.119 seconds in the fast-paced 15-minute session. Taylor and season-long co-driver Filipe Albuquerque have extended their championship lead as a result of the pole and 35 maximum points. The duo will share driving duties with NTT IndyCar Series star Alexander Rossi tomorrow’s third leg of the Michelin Endurance Cup.
Renger van der Zande qualified the No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R third on the grid, ahead of the No. 48 Action Express Racing Cadillac of Kamui Kobayashi in fourth.
Teammate Pipo Derani completed the top-five overall and in the DPi class, followed by the No. 55 Mazda RT24-P, which was qualified by Oliver Jarvis.
The No. 5 JDC-Miller Motorsports Cadillac of Tristan Vautier brought up the rear of the seven-car class.
DPi's making their first scheduled pit stops and so far it's been all Acura. These guys have a ton of pace today, the question is can they maintain it over the course of 6 hours.
Nothing too crazy yet, we've seen two short cautions but for the most part the race has been clean for the DPi's
Mazda still cruising near the back of the pack but that seems to be Mazda's MO in endurance races. Let's hope it's strategy and they can start making a run a few hours in
#60 reporting small amounts of smoke in the cab
oh oh
They've been scorching fast all race, this could be interesting if they have to go diving into the pits.
Mazda putting down some quick times and is up in 4th position.
Dane Cameron out of the 60 and mentioned there was quite a bit o smoke in the car, seems something electrical so they turned off the cabin fans (which will suck in this weather) but the smoke seemed to get better but still there. Something to keep an eye on.
Mazda leap frogged the #10 during that FCY pit stop.
Ricky Taylor had triple stinted and finally out of the car. Mazda changed drivers as well with Bomarito in the car for the first time today.
another crazy leaderboard shuffle on that FCY pit stop.
the leader dropped to 3rd
Mazda went from 2nd to 4th
and I think the #31 cadillac went from 5th to 1st.
approaching the 2 hour mark and not looking great for Mazda.
I wonder if they're playing the fuel strategy game (last 2 races fuel strategy was key to wins for other teams) by saving fuel and hoping for a yellow so they can short fill the car?
or is there something wrong with the car: maybe the turbo isn't liking these temperatures?
2:10 to go, Mazda in 5th and a full 16 seconds behind the leaders.
I missed the first couple of hours, but it looks like they're playing it safe for fuel. The little power boost means they have to be a little more careful.
looks like there's an issue with the left rear.
lots of tape went on during that last pit stop, it cost them a few seconds but they're running stead in 4th.
seem to be slowly reeling in the 01 (which ironically has the fastest lap of the race)
here's the caution we needed in order to bunch the field back up.
Are we going to see all the DPi cars come in for the last time? This is about to get exciting as soon as pit lane opens back up again.
caution won't help us though because the 31 has enough to finish and will just coast through.
Mazda saying they DO have enough fuel to finish IF there isn't an extra lap added so they have to hit their marks to ensure they cross white flag with about 1:33 to go?
this is going to be a crazy finish
Mazda does the impossible and WINS!
wow.
nail biter
can't believe that last stint by Tincknell, talk about pushing their fuel window to the absolute limit. Now to see if they have enough fuel to get to victory lane.
Derani Expecting “Different” Strategy to Play Out in WGI 2
DPi championship contenders’ thoughts ahead of WeatherTech 240 at The Glen…
Pipo Derani is expecting a different strategy to play out in Friday’s WeatherTech 240 compared to last weekend’s Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen although admitted it will be difficult to further improve his Action Express Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R.
Derani, Felipe Nasr and Mike Conway recorded a fourth place finish in the IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup round after a late-race charge while being on a different fuel strategy to the top three finishing DPis.
With a six-hour race’s worth of data to analyze, albeit in a compressed timeframe, the Brazilian is hopeful of making further inroads on the competition.
“I think this weekend’s race is going to be different in terms of strategy because it’s much shorter,” Derani said.
“But, at the same time, I think we can apply a lot of what we learned from this past weekend in terms of the car setup. [Last weekend], it was a very difficult fuel savings race.
“Sometimes this can play on your side or it can play against you. We’re going to try to put everything we’ve learned together to have a better race and hopefully be back on the podium for this short two-hour-and-forty-minute race.
“We’ve been working hard and trying to improve the car every session. Having such a short time to practice, it will be even more difficult to try to improve the car.
“So, gathering all of the information from last weekend’s race is going to be important and hopefully we can apply it the right way so we can have a more competitive Whelen Cadillac this weekend.”
Derani and Nasr sit third in the DPi championship race, 157 points behind leaders Wayne Taylor Racing’s Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque, who recorded a podium finish last weekend.
Taylor feels going back to the same track in the matter of days will help the Acura team in further fine-tuning its setup.
Both the Nos. 10 and 60 Acura ARX-05s showed strong race pace last weekend although lost out on the win to the No. 55 Mazda RT24-P of Harry Tincknell, Oliver Jarvis and Jonathan Bomarito on fuel strategy.
“It’s nice to go back-to-back at the same racetrack especially because we know exactly what we want for this week and don’t have to wait another year to make those changes,” said Taylor.
“Our debrief will act more like a pre-event and those meetings have evolved into one where we can hopefully turn a third-place finish into a win.”
Albuquerque added: “Although this race is going to be shorter, Ricky and I are going to have the same exact stints that we had at the Six Hour, except we won’t have Alex [Rossi].
“We need to analyze the car more and do the right decisions to make a better car.
“We will see how the strategy plays out because that is a big role with the engineers, how the mechanics can do the pit stops better than the other teams so we are there to overtake on track.”
While I agree that the strategies will differ and this race probably isn't going to be a fuel strategy race like the one we just saw, I also think we'll see some similarity to the 6 Hours at the Glen.
Mainly, the pace of the Acuras.
Those cars (especially the 60) a great fit for this track and it showed not just in their lap times but even if you looked at the track sectors, they were blazing fast through S1 and S2
Not sure this is an ideal track for the Cadillacs so they probably will still be a little off pace but I have to think going into this sprint race, the Acuras remain the cars to beat.
06-26-2021, 01:18 PM
