He swiftly kicked off with a 1:28.873 (6), 1:28.340
(8), 1:28.249 (11), 1:26.780 (12), 1:27.419 (14),
1:27.514 (15), 1:27.704 (17), 1:27.034 (19) and a
1:28.198 (21) before pitting to hand over to Nicky
with a third of the session completed.
Nicky turned in a 1:25.956 (28), 1:25.301 (29) and a
1:25.170 (31) before the first red flag of the
session was waved after 31 minutes as the #2 P1 Audi
and #88 P2 Creation went off track at turn 6. Back
out of the pits as the track returned to green
conditions five minutes later, Nicky wrapped up his
participation with a 1:26.206 (40) and 1:26.355 (42)
before handing over to Marc. The German returned to
the track with just a quarter of an hour remaining
and ran a 1:25.550 (49), 1:25.536 (51), 1:31.003
(53), 1:25.323 (54), 1:27.087 (56), 1:25.884 (57)
and a 1:25.527 (59) before the chequered flag was
waved.
The 20-minute qualifying session would see Nicky in
the cockpit, and the former European F3000 Champion
posted five consistent flying laps (1:24.712,
1:24.574, 1:24.111, 1:24.183 and 1:24.326) in the
#18 car, with the third of these, in 1:24.011 (95.79
mph), enough to put the car onto the fifth row of
the GT2 class grid in 9th place.
The team now looks forward to tomorrow. Race day
(Saturday 18th October) sees the race warm up
session (9:55 – 10:20 AM) before the Monterey Sports
Car Championships, the final round of the 2008
American Le Mans Series gets underway. The four-hour
race into darkness is scheduled to start at 2:45 PM
with the checkered flag scheduled to be waved at
6:45 PM. NBC Sports will air the race from 2:00 to
4:00 PM on Sunday, October 19. XM Satellite Radio
will air the race from 4:00 to 8:00 PM (ET) on the
same day. American Le Mans Radio will have live
coverage on
americanlemans.com,
which also will feature Live Timing & Scoring.
Roland Wall, Technical Director VICI Racing: “We are
ready for the race, I wasn’t sure that I would be
able to say that after Petit [Le Mans], but this
team has shown it’s professionalism and a real tough
streak so I’m proud of the crew, they have worked
wonders, and lots of long hours. It’s been a new
situation for us with the Dunlop tires this week and
without any time to test we have started from a zero
base. But I’m happy with the tires’ performance, we
have learnt a lot quickly, and I think we can rely
on their durability tomorrow. We have a good set up
for the race, the Porsche goes well at Laguna [Seca]
and all the drivers have done well in quickly
getting used to a new track, so let’s look forward
and hope that we can end the season on a nice note
with a good result.”
Nicky Pastorelli (Netherlands): “I’m reasonably
pleased with my qualifying lap though my best lap
was slightly compromised by a car in front that got
into the dirt so I think in ideal situation we could
have got a few more tenths out of it for sure.
However we are in good shape for the race, the RSR
feels good round here and the tires are an
improvement, they give me much more confidence. The
track is nice; it’s quite easy to learn for sure. It
you keep to the line it’s quite smooth and fast but
if you get off line then you get into a lot of dirt.
We can look forward to the race tomorrow as we have
a good car round here and hopefully get a good
result.”
|
