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The Preferred Line - Sebring GT Qualifying report

3/16/2006 - The Preferred Line - Road racing news and commentary
SPEED World Challenge Sebring 2006 Special Edition - GT Qualifying (March 16, 2006) By Jim Bourn

"We won practice and we won qualifying but now we have to win a race for Banner Engineering. That would be an absolute thrill! - Leighton Reese putting his pole position in perspective.

Photo: Leighton Reese is congratulated by his crew chief Joe Kantarik moments after winning the GT pole at Sebring.

Leighton Reese powers Banner Engineering Corvette to pole position at Sebring

Leighton Reese's week got off to a rocky start as he and crew chief Joe Kantarik couldn't agree on a setup. But the Opening round of the SPEED World Challenge GT Series here at Sebring has definitely improved for the veteran Minnetonka Minnesota racer as he and his Banner Engineering Chevy Corvette C6 seemingly have the field covered.

Reese used an aggressive approach to qualifying and blasted away the track record with a time of 2:08.764 en route to winning his third World Challenge pole position.

"We were in a good position due to our last year's finish in points and we know from the practice the car goes well in really clean air with no one in front of us," said Reese of his qualifying strategy. 'I got in front of Tommy (Archer) and I made a play to get by Andy (Pilgrim) but he wanted no traffic also so we drag raced for a couple of corners and I decided to back off and let him go because I didn't want to get my tires too hot on the out lap."

"It worked out well, there was enough spacing and I didn't hold Tommy up and I didn't catch up to Andy so it worked out well," Leighton concluded.

"All we wanted was enough room for a clean lap and not to catch up to anyone," said Reese's crew chief Joe Kantarik. "We only needed two good laps." Actually only one lap was needed as Reese tried to improve on his initial time and thought he was faster on his second lap was shocked to learn that he was almost 1.3 seconds slower!

One driver who did improve on his second pass was Mike McCann who powered his McCann Plastics/K&N Filters Dodge Viper into second spot less than two tenths off the pole.

Mike, who has been rock fast all week reported that he didn't he probably didn't get his tires up to temp before his first lap so he dropped almost exactly 1/2 second on his second pass. Same driver, same car, different team but Tommy Archer turned in a 2:09.224 which held up for 3rd on the grid in his c3controls/Autohaus Dodge Viper. Tommy is all smiles as he is just about right where he was last year when he won this race so watch out for the #5 tomorrow!

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