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Mosport International Raceway

Gran Turismo 3 Grand Prix

19/08/2001

Saturday Free Practice

Report

© Tom Kjos

Mosport, Ontario, Canada--Saturday's morning Practice Session, the first official ALMS practice of the weekend, yesterday being designated as testing, opened under a largely unbroken cloud cover and cool temperatures but without yesteday's winds.

Friday was a day of intriguing performances by Rob Dyson's Thetford-Norcold Riley & Scott Mark IIIC, and Team Cadillac's LMP 01, an evolution of the chassis built for them by Riley & Scott last season. The red Panoz Roadster S of David Brabham and Jan Magnussen also performed well, beaten only late in testing by the Audi R8 of Biela and Pirro. Champion put its 2000 model R8 closer to the front than previously also, but for all of these there will have to be validation today.

Early in the session there was not. The Joest-run Audi Sport North America R8s quickly established their claim to the top of the heap, ripping off fast lap after fast lap, the best a Tom Kristensen 1:09.102 set within 20 minutes of the start of the session. Soon after, however, the timing board happily begins to look like it did in testing. Better, even, since it is not the Panoz cars right there with the Joest Audis, but rather Champion's R8, which has split the two silver cars, and right behind those three none other than the Dyson R&S. A 1:10.241 put the Lincoln V8-powered white and blue prototype right where it left off yesterday. The best that Panoz could garner halfway through the session was a fifth place, the two red roadsters bracketing the two Caddies holding down 6th and 7th spots among the eight LMP 900 prototypes.
Didier de Radigues continued to keep the #5 Dick Barbour Racing Reynard / Judd LMP675 right behind the bigger prototypes, while the other two LMP675 entries mixed it up with the GTS cars.

In GT, the BMW GTRs stepped up the pace from yesterday, three of the four quickly putting up times in the 1:19s, and those three all leading the first of the Porsches, the Alex Job Racing #23 GT3-RS. The 'odd man out' is Bill Auberlen, still in the 1:20s. On a fast lap that might put the GTR into the game, Auberlen's #10 BMW is tagged by the #8 Cadillac of Max Angelelli and clouts the tire wall in turn nine hard, bringing out a red flag at 10:30 with twenty minutes left in this first session. Bill was unconscious in the car for a few seconds, but conscious when brought into the medical center in a neck brace. Early reports are that there is no serious injury, though he has been transported to a nearby hospital as a precaution. The car seems to be not badly damaged at first look, not so good later. Only time will tell if this car will see the track today, or even tomorrow.

Over the remaining 20 minutes of the session, only Emmanuel Collard improves significantly, putting the #7 Cadillac ahead of the #50 Panoz into 5th. So the LMP 900 chart in the first practice session has an unusual look about it. Champion Racing holds the second spot, Dyson Racing the fourth, and Cadillac the fifth. Panoz is relegated to sixth and eighth in an eight-car field. Given that this is a track on which the Panoz cars have been very good in the past, they certainly are not done yet. The story continues into the second practice session and qualifying this afternoon.

The #5 Barbour LMP 675 continued to pace the "lights" class, but Claudia Huertgen puts the KnightHawk Lola Nissan between the two Judd-powered Barbour cars.

As they did yesterday, and against predicted form, both Corvettes continue to hold sway in GTS, with better than a half second of time on the Konrad Saleen of Terry Borcheller and Franz Konrad. David Donohue and Shane Lewis have been able to get the #45 Viper free of all but two of the GT cars with a 1:19.896, still more than a second slower than Donohue's time last year with Oreca and two seconds slower than the best Viper time of 2000.

Yesterday, Alex Job's # 23 Porsche GT3-RS cracked the 'front row' in GT, but not so far today, as Dirk Müller puts a 1:19.439 into the books with the #43 BMW Motorsports GTR. He is followed by teammate Jörg Müller in the #42 car, and the still lonely Hans Stuck driving the #6 PTG BMW GTR. (Buddy Boris Said is at Road America where Trans Am is running on the undercard of the CART race. 'Busy Boris' will hop a plane for Mosport later today.) Sascha Maassen is able to get the Porsche under 1:20, and teammates Randy Pobst and Christian Menzel put the #22 sister car right behind him just a smidgen outside 1:20. Petersen Motorsports and Seikel Motorsports fill out the competitive GT field, while the 'R class' (Porsche GT3s not upgraded to the current RS spec) is populated by the Barbour Racing #15 and local favorite Kyser Racing's #69 nearly nine seconds and thirteen seconds, respectively, back of the GT leader.