Sebring 12H: Albuquerque tops first practice in WTR-Andretti Acura
Filipe Albuquerque’s best effort in the Wayne Taylor Racing Andretti Autosport Acura ARX-06 meant he topped the 90-minute first practice session for the 12 Hours of Sebring.
GTP
Electrical issues delayed the WTR-Andretti car from strutting its stuff on track, so that Albuquerque had just 14 laps to get the job done, but his eighth lap was a 1min48.303sec around the legendary 3.74-mile track. That was enough for him to shade Renger van der Zande’s top time in the #01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac V-Series.R by 0.133sec, and the Action Express Racing Caddy of Jack Aitken by a further tenth.
Connor De Phillippi was just 0.432sec away from top time in the #25 BMW M Hybrid, but his co-driver Sheldon van der Linde shunted the car in the closing minutes, bringing the session to a halt under a red flag. Augusto Farfus in the sister BMW was fifth, but 0.6sec behind.
The #6 Porsche 963 of Porsche Penske Motorsport ran 29 laps, but was 1.1sec down on Albuquerque’s benchmark.
Having been delayed in hitting the track by an electronics problem, the Meyer Shank Racing Acura then ground to a halt with less than 20mins of the session left, before occupant Tom Blomqvist had set a truly representative time. That brought out the second red flag of the session.
When the session restarted with 10mins to go, Matt Campbell went off on cold tires at Turn 3 after just one lap in the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963, then limping back to the pits, for a new rear end, but unable to set a true flyer due to the final red flag for the crashed BMW.
LMP2
Christian Rasmussen of Era Motorsport topped the class, just over two-tenths of a second faster than Giedo van der Garde of TDS Racing, with George Kurtz of Crowdstrike Racing by APR in third, mere hundredths behind. Scott Huffaker was a further tenth back in the second TDS machine with Paul-Loup Chatin fifth for PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports.
LMP3
Up until the final five minutes, the smallest prototypes were led by Felipe Fraga in the Riley Motorsports Ligier JS P320, but Dakota Dickerson of Jr III Racing nipped ahead by half a tenth to claim top spot. Gabby Chaves of Andretti Autosport was a further half second in arrears, but ahead of the fastest Duqueine-mounted driver, Nico Varrone (AWA).
GTD Pro / GTD
After IMSA’s Balance of Performance left the Porsche 911 GT3 Rs lame during the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona, they appear to be back in the hunt here at Sebring. Trent Hindman wheeled the #77 Wright Motorsports Porsche to top time in the GT3 cars, ahead of Jack Hawksworth who led the GTD Pro runners in the Vasser Sullivan Racing Lexus RC F.
Kyle Marcelli’s Racers Edge Motorsport with WTR Acura NSX was third ahead of a second Lexus, the GTD entry piloted by Parker Thompson, while Mikael Grenier was fifth in the Team Korthoff Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3.
Second practice begins at 3.50pm local (Eastern) time, with third practice commencing at 7.45pm.
| Cla | Num | Driver | Class | Chassis | Laps | Time | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 10 |  Ricky Taylor  Filipe Albuquerque  Louis Deletraz | GTP | Acura ARX-06 | 14 | 1'48.303 | |
| 2 | 01 |  Sébastien Bourdais  Renger van der Zande  Scott Dixon | GTP | Cadillac V-Series.R | 28 | 1'48.436 | 0.133 |
| 3 | 31 |  Pipo Derani  Alexander Sims Jack Aitken | GTP | Cadillac V-Series.R | 33 | 1'48.534 | 0.231 |
| 4 | 25 | Connor de Phillippi Nick Yelloly  Sheldon Van Der Linde | GTP | BMW M Hybrid V8 | 23 | 1'48.735 | 0.432 |
| 5 | 24 |  Philipp Eng Augusto Farfus  Marco Wittmann | GTP | BMW M Hybrid V8 | 24 | 1'49.353 | 1.050 |
| 6 | 6 | Nick Tandy Mathieu Jaminet Dane Cameron | GTP | Porsche 963 | 29 | 1'49.437 | 1.134 |
| 7 | 60 | Tom Blomqvist Colin Braun Helio Castroneves | GTP | Acura ARX-06 | 7 | 1'50.893 | 2.590 |
| 8 | 18 | Dwight Merriman Ryan Dalziel Christian Rasmussen | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 37 | 1'50.926 | 2.623 |
| 9 | 35 | François Heriau Giedo van der Garde Josh Pierson | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 39 | 1'51.140 | 2.837 |
| 10 | 04 | George Kurtz Ben Hanley Nolan Siegel | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 37 | 1'51.166 | 2.863 |
| 11 | 11 | Steven Thomas  Mikkel Jensen Scott Huffaker | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 37 | 1'51.275 | 2.972 |
| 12 | 52 | Ben Keating Paul-Loup Chatin Alex Quinn | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 35 | 1'51.310 | 3.007 |
| 13 | 20 | Dennis Andersen  Ed Jones Anders Fjordbach | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 35 | 1'51.458 | 3.155 |
| 14 | 8 |  John Farano Scott McLaughlin Kyffin Simpson | LMP2 | ORECA LMP2 07 | 32 | 1'51.708 | 3.405 |
| 15 | 7 |  Matt Campbell Felipe Nasr Michael Christensen | GTP | Porsche 963 | 5 | 1'51.892 | 3.589 |
| 16 | 51 | Eric Lux Devlin DeFrancesco Pietro Fittipaldi
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