Skip Barber National: Q1

Friday, October 27, 2006 TOOELE, Utah - Friday afternoon, the three championship contenders for the 2006 Skip Barber National Presented by RACER -- Jonathan Goring, Marco Di Leo and Alexander Rossi -- qualified for Saturday's race one at Miller Motorsports Park. Somewhat of a surprise was Kyle Lawrence (not completely, as his results at Trois-Rivieres will attest), who split-up the "big three" by qualifying second. In grid order, with their qualifying lap times, are shots of the nine drivers in the SBN finale at Miller...

1:38.113 Goring didn't let a four-off slow him down (note the tumbleweed corpse on his front wing). His fastest lap was his last.

1:38.210 Lawrence was 1.5 seconds away in practice this morning but four of his last five laps in qualifying were in the :38s.

1:38.264 In contrast to Goring, Rossi didn't get a chance to take advantage of the better grip offered in the second half of the session; an off road excursion in the Devil Complex resulted in a holed radiator and he had to park it.

1:38.424 Di Leo will start alongside Rossi in row two.

1:38.713 Peter Husser showed a smoothness and calmness that was not always apparent this year. And it got him fifth on the grid.

1:39.374 Jason Fennessey will start a solid sixth. He and Mario Adrian Ochoa both have 340 points coming into the weekend.

1:39.700 Ochoa is coming off a fifth and a third at the Road America/Champ Car weekend.

1:40.126 Jonathan Gore will start eighth.

1:40.222 Kayman Benetti is in his first-ever National, yet is just two seconds off the polesitter.

Rick Roso