O.C. Drivers Dominate Atlantic Qualifying

Orange County drivers dominated practice and qualifying Friday in the Toyota Atlantic Series at the Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach.

Laguna Niguel’s Andrew Bordin and Newport Beach’s Daniel Wheldon, driving for PPI Motorsports of Rancho Santa Margarita, finished one-two in provisional qualifying--but not without controversy.

The two drivers, along with P-1 Racing’s Rocky Moran Jr. of Coto de Caza and Masaoki Nagashima, were part of a media day last week, taking part in three 15-minute on-track sessions that provided them an early glimpse of the reconfigured 1.968-mile street course.

“These guys had [three] more sessions than everybody else,” said Buddy Rice, the series leader, after qualifying third. “We’re all playing catch-up.”

The situation was made worse when Friday morning’s 30-minute practice session was limited to eight minutes because the track wasn’t ready. An additional 10 minutes was added to qualifying.

“It’s logical that there was an advantage,” said Bordin, fourth in the series with 20 points after two races. Wheldon (37 points) is second, two points behind Rice.

In the morning session, Bordin and Wheldon finished one-two; Moran and Nagashima were fourth and eighth, but less successful in qualifying. Moran, third in the series, was 14th after colliding with a car, and Nagashima was 12th.

“We came off the truck not knowing the gearing, and those guys--’Boom!’ ” said Justin Gurney, team manager for Newport Beach driver Alex Gurney. “All these other guys are really mad about it.”

Gurney was ninth-fastest in practice, 13th in qualifying.

Moran said he got a “a good feel for the car” in the previous sessions, which took place on a dirty surface and had pro-celebrity cars on the track. “I would’ve been upset if I knew another team was doing it.”

Wheldon crashed during the media day.

“We invited some local teams because there wouldn’t be a lot of expense for them to participate,” said Grand Prix spokesman Kevin O’Brien. “Two years in a row, both those teams sat in the rain and didn’t turn a wheel, and we felt an obligation to invite them back under ideal conditions.”

There will be a second qualifying session today at 8:55 a.m. The race begins at 3:15 p.m.

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Costa Mesa driver Townsend Bell qualified 11th in the Indy Lights race. Bell was penalized twice for exceeding the speed limit in the pits, once in practice, once in qualifying.

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Cristiano da Matta was upbeat. After qualifying poorly on ovals at Homestead (23rd) and Nazareth (20th), da Matta was 11th-fastest during CART Championship Series provisional qualifying, and it could have been even better.

“I sure think we can improve [today],” said da Matta, a PPI driver. “I couldn’t get the best out of the tires because when the tires were at their best, I was in traffic.”

He averaged 102.284 mph.