Date: May 16, 2008
Event: RumBum.com 250
Series: Daytona Prototype division of the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series
Location: Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Monterey, Calif. (2.238-mile, 11-turn road course)
Pole Winner: David Donohue of Brumos Porsche Racing (1:19.843 at 100.908 mph)
SunTrust Racing: Seventh by Michael Valiante (1:21.220 at 99.197 mph)

SunTrust Racing co-drivers Michael Valiante and Max Angelelli will start Saturday’s Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series RumBum.com 250 from the inside of the fourth row after qualifying Friday at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca near Monterey, Calif..

Valiante drove the No. 10 SunTrust Pontiac Dallara of Wayne Taylor Racing to a fast lap of 1 minute, 21.220 seconds (99.197 mph) over the 2.238-mile, 11-turn hillside road circuit, where Angelelli and Jan Magnussen co-drove SunTrust to victory in 2006. It was the seventh-fastest lap among 42 car-and-driver combinations set to take the green flag late Saturday afternoon.

“Unfortunately, we didn’t roll out of the trailer very quick today, and with such limited track time, it’s tough to try too many things before qualifying,” said Valiante, who started the SunTrust car on the pole at Virginia International Raceway near Alton three weekends ago, and also on the front row in the debut event for the Dallara chassis at Homestead (Fla.) Miami Speedway the last weekend in March. “We missed the first 25 minutes of practice this morning with an electrical issue. It’s definitely disappointing that we’re seventh. But we’ve made big improvements on the car since the first session. That’s the thing with the new car. There are some places we go that are not going to suit the car right away but we just have to keep working through it, which we’ve been doing. We’re definitely going in the right direction. With another hour of practice Saturday morning, by the time the race comes, we’ll be much stronger.”

David Donohue qualified on the pole for the second time this season in the No. 58 Brumos Porsche Riley. The defending-series-champion No. 99 Gainsco Pontiac Riley grabbed the outside-front-row starting spot at the hands of Jon Fogarty, while the current point leader, the No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates Lexus Riley, qualified third with Memo Rojas behind the wheel. Last year’s race winner, the No. 23 Alex Job Racing Porsche Crawford of driver Joey Hand, qualified fourth.

“I always thought that this was going to be a difficult track simply because we’ve got such little mileage and we’ve never been here with the new car,” said team owner Wayne Taylor. “You know, the series is really competitive. The guys have obviously worked hard, especially after we lost 25 minutes this morning. I think we’ll have a better race car than we have a qualifying car. We’re continually learning about the car. At the last second, we tried to use bigger dive planes than we’ve used before. Now we’ve got to go back and study everything and see what we need to do. I was expecting more, but we’ve got to deal with what we’ve got to deal with. I have no doubt we’ll have a better race car.”

The top-five in qualifying were the following teams:

1. Brumos Porsche (No. 58 Porsche Riley) with David Donohue and Darren Law (1:19.843 at 100.908 mph)

2. Bob Stallings/Riley-Matthews Racing (No. 99 Pontiac Riley) with Jon Fogarty and Alex Gurney (1:19.951 at 100.771 mph)

3. Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates (No. 01 Lexus Riley) with Memo Rojas and Scott Pruett (1:20.270 at 100.371 mph)

4. Alex Job Racing (No. 23 Porsche Crawford) with Joey Hand and Bill Auberlen (1:20.318 at 100.311 mph)

5. AIM Autosport (No. 61 Ford Riley) with Mark Wilkins and Brian Frisselle (1:20.523 at 100.055 mph)

Final practice is set for 1 p.m. EDT Saturday. Race time is 4:45 p.m. with SPEED-TV’s next-day-delayed broadcast slated for noon EDT Sunday. Complete results from all on-track sessions, as well as live timing and scoring during the race, can be found at www.grand-am.com.