Nate Stacy and KohR Motorsports are picking up right where they left off.
Hours after scoring their first checkered flag of the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge season in the first race of the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course doubleheader, Stacy kept the No. 60 Aston Martin Vantage GT4 atop the leaderboard ahead of Race 2 on Sunday morning.
Stacy – who co-drives with Kyle Marcelli – bookended the day with Motul Pole Awards, scoring his third career pole position Saturday morning and the subsequent fourth pole in the evening. His second pole-winning time of the day was one minute, 26.917 seconds (93.523 mph).
“Man, I feel like I was just here this morning,” Stacy joked. “The car felt awesome again. The track cooled off this evening, so the car was still hooked up. We made some changes to the car to try and compensate for the cooler track conditions and the team just nailed it. I had no issues with the car whatsoever. It was on rails.
“We were performing at this level for a while and I’m really glad we could put it together in the first race, and hopefully we can get double wins this weekend.”
On on the heels of Stacy and Marcelli, however, were reigning Grand Sport (GS) champions Tyler McQuarrie and Jeff Westphal in the No. 39 CarBahn with Peregrine Racing Audi R8 GT4. The pair finished second in Race 1 and qualified second for Race 2 with a time of 1:26.996 (93.438 mph).
In the TCR class, the pole winner wasn’t determined until the last car crossed the finish line on the last lap of the 15-minute qualifying session.
Taylor Hagler became the third female in Pilot Challenge history to win a pole position behind Valerie Limoges and Sarah Cattaneo, the latter being the series’ most recent female polesitter at Sebring International Raceway in 2017. Hagler’s No. 77 L.A. Honda World Honda Civic TCR posted the quickest lap of TCR competitors with a time of 1:30.597 (89.724 mph).
The accomplishment comes just hours after Hagler and co-driver and driving coach Ryan Eversley earned their first podium of the season, finishing second in Race 1.
“It was pretty intense, I was just trying to chip away and not make changes,” said Hagler. “I didn’t really know I was pole because the entire team was celebrating and I couldn’t hear anything they were saying. But they were telling me before that if I got pole, they all got to go to Topgolf, so I had to do something. I ended up being able to pull it out. But being here at Honda’s home and pretty much being here for the first time in my rookie season, it’s pretty big, it means a lot.”
Hagler’s time was down to the wire not only on the lap count, but also on the time charts. She narrowly topped Roy Block’s lap of 1:30.610 (89.711 mph). Max Faulkner – who with co-driver James Vance won Race 1 earlier in the day – led most of the qualifying session but will start third in the No. 23 FASTMD Racing with Speed Syndicate Audi RS3 LMS.
The second Pilot Challenge Race at Mid-Ohio is set for Sunday at 10:35 a.m. ET. The race can be streamed live on TrackPass on NBC Sports Gold.