Renger van der Zande set the pace for the opening practice for the Rolex 24 at Daytona, pipping Mike Conway by less than a tenth of a second.
Van der Zande set a 01:34.649 in the #01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac DPi-VR, just 0.082s ahead of Conway in the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac.
In third, Harry Tincknell was just over half a tenth away from Conway, almost a tenth and a halved behind van der Zande, in the #55 Multimatic Mazda RT24-P. That left the Wayne Taylor Racing Acura ARX-05, driven by Ricky Taylor, to pick up the pieces in fourth place.
In LMP2, Nico Lapierre set a time of 01:36.153 and led the way in the #52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA 07-Gibson, with Ben Hanley in #81 DragonSpeed ORECA 07-Gibson more than two tenths off the Frenchman.
Job van Uitert was hot on Hanley’s heels, though, with the #29 Racing Team Nederland ORECA 07-Gibson driver just over four hundreths away.
Jeroen Bleekemolen was the only LMP3 driver faster than a GTLM car. The Riley Motorsports Ligier JS P320 driver was almost four tenths quicker than Colin Braun in the CORE autosport Ligier JS P320, topping the time sheets with a 01:42.416, Third in class was the #6 Muehlner Motorsports America Duqueine D08, driven by Kenton Koch.
In GTLM, in what will be the class’s final Rolex 24 at Daytona, Tommy Milner in the #4 Corvette Racing C8.R went quickest with 01:42.766, with his teammate Antonio Garcia three tenths back in the sister #3 Corvette Racing C8.R.
Jules Gounon was a further tenth and a half off in the #62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE Evo.
Finally, in GTD, Billy Johnson in the #28 Alegra Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3 Evo edged out Earl Bamber, in the #88 Team Hardpoint EBM Porsche 911 GT3 R, by a few hundreths of a second. Johnson’s 01:45.822 was enough to beat out Bamber by 0.042s, the smallest margin to the lead in the session.
Third in GTD went to another Porsche, Matt Campbell in the #9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R.
Practice 2 for the 2021 Rolex 24 at Daytona starts at 3:20pm ET (8:20pm UTC).
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