The Latest Breaking News from Tom Blomqvist

Acura’s Louis Deletraz led the 54-car field to the green around the undulating 2.54-mile road course in Georgia but Sebastien Bourdais took little time in taking the lead, sweeping his Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac around the Wayne Taylor Racing ARX-06 outside at Turn 1 and quickly pulling clear.

Albuquerque set the fastest tour on his very last lap of the session in Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport’s Acura ARX-06, to beat the Meyer Shank Racing example of Tom Blomqvist by 0.003s.

The #7 Penske Porsche Motorsport 963 of Matt Campbell started on pole and led the field to the green flag.

The speedy Swede, who is joining Meyer Shank Racing in 2024, drove “a gorilla lap” flyer of 1m06.6416s lap on the 11-turn, 2.238-mile natural terrain road course.

Pagenaud has been forced onto the sidelines ever since a heavy crash in practice for the Mid-Ohio round in July, triggered by an apparent brake failure, left him with post-concussion symptoms and curtailed his campaign.

The two-time series champion and reigning Indy 500 winner simply summarized the rebound after by quipping: “The car looks better than when I wrecked it.”

Pagenaud has suffered ongoing concussion-like symptoms following his huge crash in practice at Mid-Ohio in July, which was caused by a brake failure.

The factory Acura team’s current deal ends after this season’s Petit Le Mans in October and its future with the brand was put in question following the manipulation of tire data in the season-opening Daytona 24 Hours, which it won.

Drama began even before the 160-minute race got underway, with the pole-sitting #31 Action Express Cadillac forced to start from the back after an incident for Alexander Sims in warmup.