Practice report
IMSA Daytona 24
Rolex 24: Rast tops opening practice for Mazda
The Joest Mazda team claimed the top spot in first free practice for this weekend's Rolex 24 at Daytona.
Gary Watkins
Edited: Jan 25, 2018, 7:17 PM
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Reigning DTM champion Rene Rast went fastest in the best of the Mazda RT24-P DPi contenders right at the end of the opening 60-minute session for the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship opener.
The German ended up on a 1m37.428s, which put him just seven thousandths up on Tristan Vautier in the Spirit of Daytona Cadillac DPi-V.R.
Cadillacs filled out the next two positions with times within a tenth of Rast's mark.
Jordan Taylor took third in the Wayne Taylor Racing entry on a 1m37.452s and Filipe Albuquerque ended up fourth on a 1m37.519s in the fastest of the Action Express cars.
The performance of the Mazda, which struggled at the Roar Before the 24 test at Daytona earlier in the month, follows a series of rules tweaks in the Prototype class.
The RT24-P has been given a 15kg weight break and an 300rpm increase in revs in a Balance of Performance change.
Cadillac, which dominated at the Roar, has had its twin engine air-restrictors cut in diameter by 0.6mm.
Alex Brundle was just over a tenth off the top spot in the best of the Jota-run Jackie Chan DC Racing Oreca-Gibsons on a 1m37.530s.
Two-time Le Mans 24 Hours winner Romain Dumas took sixth in the CORE autosport Oreca.
The best of the Penske Acura ARX-05s ended up 10th in the hands of Graham Rahal on a 1m38.084s.
Sportscar debutant Fernando Alonso did not drive in the session after teammate Phil Hanson had a minor off in their United Autosports Ligier-Gibson JS P217s.
Hanson, who was fifth fastest at the time, went off at Turn 5, the car sustaining minor front-end damage.
Joey Hand led the way for Ford in the GTLM class.
The American posted a 1m44.062s in his Ganassi Ford GT, which put him nearly half a second up on second-placed Alessandro Pier Guidi in the Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE.
Laurens Vanthoor was just three hundredths behind in third position at the wheel of the fastest of the CORE-run factory Porsche 911 RSRs.
Miguel Molina took top spot in the GTD division in his Risi Ferrari 488 GT3 with a best time of 1m47.223s.
First practice results (top 10):
Pos.No.DriversChassisTimeGap 1 77 
Oliver Jarvis
René Rast
Tristan Nunez Mazda DPi 1'37.428 2 90 Matt McMurry
Tristan Vautier
Eddie Cheever III Cadillac DPi 1'37.435 0.007 3 10 Jordan Taylor
Ryan Hunter-Reay
Renger van der Zande Cadillac DPi 1'37.452 0.024 4 5 
Christian Fittipaldi
Filipe Albuquerque
Joao Barbosa Cadillac DPi 1'37.519 0.091 5 78 
Ho-Pin Tung
Antonio Felix da Costa
Alex Brundle
Ferdinand Habsburg ORECA LMP2 1'37.530 0.102 6 54 Loic Duval
Romain Dumas
Jon Bennett
Colin Braun ORECA LMP2 1'37.563 0.135 7 37 Robin Frijns
Daniel Juncadella
Felix Rosenqvist
Lance Stroll ORECA LMP2 1'37.766 0.338 8 31 Mike Conway
Eric Curran
Felipe Nasr
Stuart Middleton Cadillac DPi 1'37.844 0.416 9 38 Joel Miller
James French
Kyle Masson
Pato O'Ward ORECA LMP2 1'37.866 0.438 10 7 Helio Castroneves
Graham Rahal
Ricky Taylor Acura DPi 1'38.084 0.656
Click here to see full results
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