Mazda Team Joest driver Rene Rast topped the timesheets of the opening practice session for this weekend's Daytona 24 Hours.
Rast, driving the #77 Mazda DPi, left it late to post a time of 1:37.428, which leapfrogged a trio of Cadillac DPi entries and placed the Mazda in front by seven thousandths of a second from Spirit of Daytona Racing's Tristan Vautier.
The result marked the first time this year that a non-Cadillac entry has led an official IMSA session, following the GM manufacturer's dominance at the pre-event Roar test weekend.
Consequently, the gaps were smaller during opening practice for the IMSA Sportscar Championship season opener, with the top 13 cars all falling under a one second blanket.
Since the Roar, Cadillac's four cars have had the size of their air restrictors curbed to bring them closer in line with the prototype competition.
Third-quickest in FP1 was Jordan Taylor, driving the Cadillac DPi of defending series champion Wayne Taylor Racing (+0.024s) ahead of Filipe Albuquerque in the #5 Action Express Cadillac (+0.091s).
The fastest global-spec LMP2 runner was the fifth-placed #78 Jackie Chan DC Racing ORECA 07, which turned in a time of 1:37.530s (+0.102) with Alex Brundle at the controls.
Sixth was Le Mans winner Romain Dumas in the CORE Autosport ORECA LMP2, who nipped ahead of Daniel Juncadella in the second Jackie Chan machine, which also features Williams F1 driver Lance Stroll.
The United Autosports Ligier featuring two-time F1 world champion Fernando Alonso ended the morning 18th, although the McLaren driver didn't manage to post a time because of an incident.
Alonso's team-mate Phil Hanson exited the track in the infield section at the start his fifth tour, bringing out the red flags for 10 minutes and consigning the Ligier to an early lunch break.
In GT Le Mans, Joey Hand led the way in the #66 Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GT.
Hand's time of 1:44.064s was half a second faster than the second-best Ferrari 488 of reigning World Endurance champion Alessandro Pier Guidi.
The Italian narrowly out-paced Laurens Vanthoor's Porsche 911 RSR and the second Ford driven by Ryan Briscoe, while Antonio Garcia lapped fifth in the best of the Corvettes.
BMW's new M8 chassis struggled to match the pace of its rival manufacturers, with quickest driver Connor de Phillippi running three seconds off the class pace.
Ferrari notched up a one-two in the GT Daytona category, as Miguel Molina (#82 Risi Competizione) edged out Pedro Lamy (#51 Spirit of Race) for the top spot.
Acura finished third with AJ Allmendinger behind the wheel of the #93 NSX-GT3, while Christopher Mies slotted the Land Motorsport Audi R8 into fourth.
Second practice for the Daytona 24 Hours is set to get underway at 13:40 (18:40 UK time), in preparation for qualifying at 16:20 (21:20 UK).
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