The Taylor train kept rolling at Circuit of The Americas on Friday, and maybe even picked up some more speed.

In qualifying for Saturday’s Advance Auto Parts Sportscar Showdown, Ricky Taylor beat the previous IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship lap record on the 3.4-mile COTA track by exactly three seconds, and beat the field by more than 1.5 seconds to take the pole position in the No. 10 Konica Minolta Cadillac DPi-V.R with a best lap of 1 minute, 54.809 seconds (106.6 mph).

It was Taylor’s second consecutive WeatherTech Championship pole – he took the No. 1 starting position for last month’s BUBBA burger Sports Car Grand Prix at Long Beach – and was the 15th of his major U.S. sports car racing pole (five WeatherTech Championship, 10 GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series).

“I know the times look dominant, but we made some big compromises for qualifying so I think the race is going to be really tough tomorrow,” he said. “We could see in the speed traps we gave up top speed to go for overall times, so tomorrow is going to be all about tires and raceability. We’re going to have to do some changes over night to make this a really good race car.”

Ricky and his brother, Jordan Taylor, are looking for their fourth consecutive WeatherTech Championship victory in Saturday’s race. They opened the year with wins in the Rolex 24 At Daytona, Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Fueled by Fresh From Florida and the BUBBA burger Sports Car Grand Prix.

They’re the first set of co-drivers to have opened the year with back-to-back-to-back overall victories ever in the WeatherTech Championship and the first pair to win three straight races in major U.S. sports car competition since Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas won three straight to open the 2011 GRAND-AM season.

It was a strong “Cinco de Mayo” performance for the Tequila Patrón ESM team. Johannes van Overbeek qualified second in the No. 22 Nissan DPi he shares with Patrón Spirits CEO Ed Brown, turning in a best lap of 1:56.401 (105.1 mph).

Defending WeatherTech Championship Prototype co-champion Eric Curran qualified third in the No. 31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac DPi. Curran’s best lap was 1:56.429 (105.1 mph) in the car he shares with Dane Cameron, his fellow defending co-champion.

While there was a 1.592-second gap from first to second, positions 2 through 7 were covered by less than one second on the Prototype grid.

French Continues Perfect Season For Performance Tech
Also turning in a dominating qualifying performance was Prototype Challenge (PC) class points leader James French in the No. 38 Performance Tech Motorsports ORECA FLM09. French turned a best lap of 2:00.066 (101.9 mph), more than 2.9 seconds quicker than second-place PC qualifier Stefan Wilson in the No. 26 BAR1 Motorsports ORECA.

French and co-driver Pato O’Ward – opened the year with back-to-back class victories at Daytona and Sebring. Wilson, meanwhile, shares the BAR1 ride with Nick Boulle, who co-drove with French and O’Ward in the No. 38 at Daytona.

The race will be televised Saturday at 7 p.m. ET on FS1.

Rondet and co-driver Mathew Keegan were second, followed by Hindman and No. 12 Porsche co-driver Cameron Cassels in third. Dillon Machavern and Dylan Murcott were fourth in the No. 28 RS1 Porsche Cayman GT4 MR, with Liddell and co-driver Matt Bell fifth in the Camaro.

In the Street Tuner (ST) class, Eric Foss and Austin resident Jeff Mosing earned their second straight COTA victory in a nail-biter over defending ST co-champions Spencer Pumpelly and Nick Galante.

Foss, driving the No. 56 Mosing Motorcars/Murillo Racing Porsche Cayman, withstood heavy pressure from Pumpelly in the No. 17 RS1 Porsche for much of the final hour of the race. Pumpelly closed right up on Foss several times but ultimately settled for second, 0.568 seconds, behind Foss.

“Honestly, it’s always great to race here at COTA in the Continental Tire Challenge and I was a little pessimistic maybe this morning,” Foss said. “We had been really fighting the setup. We came here and tested about a month ago and we thought we found something new that was going to work out for us and then we got here for the race weekend and we just found we just really struggled in practice.

“I know we showed some times in the practice that looked promising but ultimately we felt that we were struggling at that point. Ken Murillo did his magic, the Continental Tires were phenomenal and I think we had a little luck there but whatever it is, we’ll take it. To win back-to-back here, I wouldn’t have even thought that was remotely possible even three hours ago.”

While C360R celebrated a 1-2 overall and Grand Sport (GS) class result, the team also had a podium in ST. Pierre Kleinubing and Roy Block took third in class driving the No. 75 Audi S3.

The next round of the 2017 Continental Tire Challenge – the Continental Tire 120 at The Glen – is Saturday, July 1.