Meyer Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian’s Nick Yelloly broke Dries Vanthoor‘s streak Friday (May 30) by winning the pole for Saturday’s Chevrolet Sports Car Classic in Detroit with a lap at 90.052 mph. It is the first pole for MSR in IMSA competition since Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in 2023.
Yelloly was .146 seconds faster than teammate Tom Blomqvist. BMW M Team RLL teammates Sheldon van der Linde and Vanthoor will line up on the second row, while Porsche Penske Motorsport’s Mathieu Jaminet will start fifth.
Entering the session, three separate GTP teams were staring down at penalties entering the session. Both of the Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillacs caused red flags in practice, along with Porsche Penske Motorsport’s No. 7 Porsche. As a result, they each lost their best lap of the session.
Early on, Nick Tandy in the No. 7 Porsche was quickest as he tried his dangdest to overcome his aforementioned penalty. Vanthoor and van der Linde were right on his tail as well. However, a trip into the runoff at turn 1 hampered Vanthoor’s charge.
Relatively cool temperatures created a couple of issues for the teams. One, it made it more difficult to put heat into the tires. Secondly, the lack of heat in the tires would also make for a rougher ride.
While the BMWs dominated much of the early portion of the session, the Acuras came to the forefront in the final five minutes. Yelloly first topped the charts with five minutes to go.
From there, he continued to improve his time. Three of his last four laps lowered the pole time. The final lap ended up being the fastest of all.
Of those that lost their best time in the session, Wayne Taylor Racing’s Filipe Albuquerque was hurt the most. He set a time that would have qualified him fifth, but will line up eighth. Both Tandy and Louis Deletraz‘s best laps would not have moved them up the order.
What was not expected during the qualifying session was precipitation. However, just as the GTD Pro session was starting, the clouds started to build up, bathing the track in shadows. As a result, everyone scrambled out onto the track as fast as they could.
Pfaff Motorsports’ Andrea Caldarelli was more or less the exception to the rule. Getting some clear track allowed him to put his Lamborghini on top early on.
Paul Miller Racing’s Dan Harper put his BMW on top shortly after the halfway point. Later on, Jack Hawksworth, driving in place of the injured Ben Barnicoat, put his Lexus on top.
As the session continued, the two Ford Multimatic Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3s came to the front. First, Christopher Mies put himself on top. After Harper and Hawksworth topped that, Sebastian Priaulx put himself on top with a lap at 83.500 mph
DragonSpeed had issues off the track leading up to the race as regular driver Giacomo Altoe was unable to make it. The team described the issue as a personal reason.
That meant that the team called on Rasmus Lindh at the last minute to drive this weekend. While most of Lindh’s experience in IMSA has come in prototypes, he did drive in a Ferrari 296 GT3 at Indianapolis last September.
In qualifying, Lindh had decent pace, but made a mistake exiting the hairpin about 20 seconds after Priaulx set his time. He clipped the outside wall exiting the hairpin, which broke a toe link. As a result, Lindh spun and hit the other wall to bring out the red flag.
At the time the red flag came out, they were 36 seconds short of the minimum 10 minutes required for a session to be official. The cleanup took almost all of the remaining time left in the session, but the green flag came back out long enough to reach the 10-minute minimum. With the team remaining, no one was able to get back around to start another hot lap before time expired.
As a result, Priaulx’s time held up to give him the class pole. He was .329 seconds faster than Mies. Hawksworth qualified third, but had his times disallowed after his Lexus failed the height sticks in post-qualifying inspection.
Hawksworth’s penalty means that Paul Miller Racing teammates Neil Verhagen and Harper will start third and fourth. Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports’ Tommy Milner is fifth.
The Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolets were fast in both practice sessions, but struggled in the session. Milner and Antonio Garcia will start fifth and eighth, respectively.
IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Chevrolet Sports Car Classic Qualifying Results
The Chevrolet Sports Car Classic is scheduled to go green at 3:40 p.m. ET Saturday afternoon. The race will stream exclusively on Peacock.
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.