David Donohue edged Timo Bernhard by 0.001 second Thursday to capture the pole position for the 47th Rolex 24 at Daytona, breaking the Daytona Prototype track record in the process.
Donohue turned in a lap of 1 minute, 40.540 seconds (127.472 mph) in the No. 58 Brumos Riley-Porsche that he will share with Darren Law, Buddy Rice and Antonio Garcia.
The race will start at 3:30 p.m. Saturday. Fox will open live network coverage at 3 p.m. Saturday. Speed Channel will resume coverage at 4:30 p.m. Saturday, continuing until 10 p.m. Sunday coverage on Speed will run from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Bernhard was at the wheel of Penske Racing’s No. 16 Riley-Porsche, turning a lap of 1:50.541 (127.470 mph) in the Daytona Prototype that he shares with Romain Dumas and Ryan Briscoe.
“Actually, winning the pole was a bit of a surprise,” said Donohue. “We had a bit of a problem with traffic on what I thought was my fastest lap. We were having an electrical gremlin, so I didn’t know how quick I was running. The team told me I was [fastest], but I didn’t know by how much and what to do with the tires. But I said it before, all that counts is where you are at 3:30 p.m. on Sunday.”
Donohue joins his father, the late Mark Donohue, as a pole winner of the event. The elder Donohue won the pole for Penske Racing in 1971. The pair joins Dan and Alex Gurney as father-son pole winners for America’s most prestigious sports-car race.
While Donohue wasn’t sure of his position in qualifying, Bernhard thought he was atop the charts.
“I knew I put down a pretty good lap, and when they give me the time, I thought it would be good enough for the pole,” said Bernhard, the overall winner of the 2003 Rolex 24. “Then they told me it was very close, but I was second, but by that time, my tires were done. It was a great result for Penske Racing. It’s a new series for us in Grand-Am, and we’re already very competitive. Looking at it that way, [second] is a very good result.”
Starting from the second row will be Michael Valiante, posting a time of 1:40.651 (127.331 mph) in the No. 6 Michael Shank Racing Riley-Ford, and Richard Zonta, with a time of 1:40.892 (127.027 mph) in the No. 76 Krohn Racing Lola-Ford.
Scott Pruett, seeking a third consecutive victory in the Rolex 24 and fourth in a row for TELMEX/Target Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates, will start sixth after running a lap of 1:41.016 (126.495 mph) in the No. 01 Riley-Lexus.
“That’s about what we expected to run in qualifying,” said Pruett. “For 24 hours, it’s not going to make a difference. The Ganassi guys have done a great job, as always, and we’ve got a great car for the race. With a little bit of luck, the TELMEX No. 01 car will be fighting for the victory at the end.”
Alex Gurney, the 2007 Rolex 24 pole winner, will start 11th in the No. 99 Gainsco/Bob Stallings Racing Riley-Pontiac co-driven by three-time NASCAR Sprint Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson, Jon Fogarty and Jimmy Vasser.
The No. 2 Childress-Howard Motorsports Crawford-Pontiac of Danica Patrick, Casey Mears, Rob Finlay and three-time Rolex 24 winner Andy Wallace lost an engine during Friday’s practice and failed to qualify. They will start the race 18th, at the back of the Daytona Prototype grid.
In GT, Sylvain Tremblay captured the Rolex 24 pole for the second consecutive year in the No.70 SpeedSource Mazda RX. Tremblay and Nick Ham seek their second consecutive GT victory in the Rolex 24, and fourth consecutive triumph at Daytona--all from the pole position. David Haskell and Jonathan Bomarito will co-drive in the Rolex 24. TRG Porsche 911 GT3 driver Andy Lally qualified second. Martin Ragginger, Jeff Segal and Wolf Henzler rounded out the top five GT qualifiers.
Thursday’s qualifying locked in the top 40 positions for the Rolex 24. Final qualifying began at 11 a.m. Friday and will be followed by the Fresh From Florida 200 Grand-Am KONI Sports Car Challenge race.
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