Winter Testing is well underway at Sebring for Tudor USCC

"SnapUndersteer, Italian Spiderman" (dasborgen)
02/20/2014 at 18:44 • Filed to: IMSA, Tudor

Words from Racer.com:

The fight for dominance among Prototype entries took an interesting swing Thursday afternoon at Sebring during the second test session for TUDOR United SportsCar Championship cars.

Recent Rolex 24 at Daytona overall winners Action Express Racing used a quick final lap to wrest the top spot on the time sheets from the Oak Racing team, powering their Corvette DP to a lap of 1:52.480 to gap the previous best recorded by the Morgan-Nissan P2 of 1:53.267 set early in the session.

"When the temperature cooled off at the end of the day there was a lot of the grip," said AXR's Sebastien Bourdais, who posted the 1:52.480. "We had a bit of an issue in the morning with the gearbox, but the day was good, the balance was good – about as good as you can probably get it. Everybody got in the car this afternoon to turn laps and they were happy.

"The car is fun; the extra downforce has made it really fun to drive. It all depends on the grip, but in these conditions, that's about all it had. The amount of commitment you could carry in the last corner and the first corner tells you how much you have left, and there wasn't much left..."

Spirit of Daytona completed the top-3 (1:53.425) with its No. 90 Corvette DP. The first Ford DP was fifth, with the No. 01 Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates Riley-EcoBoost setting a 1:54.686.

Honda's new DP engine completed 16 laps in the back of Starworks Motorsport's Riley chassis, logging a best of 1:59.023.

The 0.787-second difference between AXR's No. 5 DP and Oak's No. 42 P2 is a nearly identical match to the 0.770-sec advantage Oak's P2 held over Wayne Taylor Racing's Corvette DP in the first test session.

8Star Motorsports led the PC class again (1:56:561) followed by both Bar1 Motorsports cars nearly two seconds behind in the undersubscribed category.

Porsche also retained its place atop the eight GT Le Mans runners with the No. 911 RSR (2:00.364), edging the No. 93 SRT Viper (2:00.496) and the sister No. 912 RSR (2:00.536). The entire GTLM class was covered by 0.639sec.

Team Falken Tire made its season debut in the No. 17 Porsche 911 RSR, placing a credible fifth on its first day (2:00.834).

GT Daytona saw 18 cars turn laps in the afternoon, with Turner Motorsport's No. 94 BMW Z4 (2:04.487) leading Park Place Motorsports' No. 73 Porsche 911 GT America (2:04.703) and Riley Motorsports' SRT Viper GT3-R (2:04.915).

sources: Turner Motorsport, Sebring International Raceway, GT Spirit, Racer