Toni Vilander qualified the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE in the eighth position on the GTLM class grid for this Saturday's 64th Annual Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Fueled by Fresh from Florida endurance race, March 19, 2016.His best time of 1:59.020, with an average speed of 113.124 mph, was clocked on the fifth lap during 87 degree F ambient and 105 degree F track temperatures in Friday's qualifying session. The very competitive GTLM pole was set by Bill Auberlen in the No. 25 BMW with a time of 1:58.402 and a speed of 113.714 mph.
Rick Mayer, Risi Competizione Race Engineer:"Qualifying certainly didn't go as planned. We had a better car than that. We run a softer setup, which races well, but it struggles with the Continental Tire Challenge rubber when they have a long race before we qualify. The soft setup seems to not clean their rubber off our Michelins. Once the track is cleaned up and softer race rubber put down we'll be much better and the handling we had in the final practice should be back."We like Sebring and I like Sebring as well. We've done well here in the past and Ferrari has been good. Obviously the rules are not in our favor currently. We will do what we can. We came back with basically the same set up we had at the Test, which was good. It's been good up to now. We should be better in the race."
Toni Vilander qualified the Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTLM"I found the track relatively much different to practice, especially compared to this morning. I just never got a hold of the race car and especially the tires. There was just no grip from the rear. We need to think about this for the race. The balance was similar to this morning but everything just got that much worse that I couldn't control that race car anymore. We will work with Rick (Mayer, Risi Competizione Race Engineer) a bit and see which direction to go for the warm up and the race. It's a bit disappointing because we saw good pace but in qualifying we had a chance but were just a bit outside the window and it was too much."
Vilander's co-drivers to share the cockpit of the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTLM for the once-around-the-clock Florida enduro and round two of the 2016 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship will be fellow Ferrari factory drivers Giancarlo Fisichella and Davide Rigon. The Risi team is hoping to add to their three victories at the Sebring, Florida circuit.
A 20-minute warm up session at 8:00 a.m. EDT will commence prior to the 12-hour race, which starts at 10:40 a.m. EDT on Saturday, March 19. Live timing and scoring is available for all on-track sessions at IMSA.com and the IMSA Smartphone app.Tune-In Information:The 64th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Fueled by Fresh from Florida live broadcast coverage gets underway at 10:30 a.m. EDT on FS1 (FOX Sports 1) and the FOX Sports GO app. Television coverage shifts to FS2 (FOX Sports 2) from Noon to 7:00 p.m.; continues on IMSA.com and the IMSA mobile app from 7:00-10 p.m., and concludes on FS2 from 10:00-11:00 p.m., including the checkered flag and winners interviews. A live international broadcast stream is available on IMSA.tv and IMSA mobile app.
