Rolex Sports Car Series Daytona International Speedway Qualifying

Daytona International Speedway
qualifying, Nov. 9, 2002

pole 10

Rand Racing will start from the SRPII pole position for Sunday's Rolex Sports 
Car Series race , after collecting its 10th class pole of the season.  Ralf 
Kelleners covered the 3.56-mile Daytona International Speedway road course in 
one minute 47.260 seconds in the No. 7 Nissan Lola he drives with Niclas 
Jönsson.  SRPII points leader Terry Borcheller qualified second in the No. 8 
Lola he shares with Anthony Lazzaro  (1:48.587).

It was Kelleners' first pole of the season.  He has driven the No. 8 car with 
Borcheller and Borcheller was selected to qualify at each previous race  to 
maximize his championship points.  Switched to the No. 7 car, Kelleners took 
full advantage of the opportunity.

"I had to get the pole," he said.  "Through the whole year I was personally 
wanting to also be in a position to qualify, but because of the team 
situation it was not possible.  Now I got the chance so I had to make the 
best of it - I had to have the pole.

"We had some problems this morning, but luckily we went in the right 
direction [with setup changes] and had a good qualifying run," he said.  "I'm 
not too happy for the race, because I'm still concerned what's going to 
happen after a couple of laps.  We don't know what's going to happen because 
we couldn't test those changes in a long run."

Borcheller said he struggled with his car's handling.  "We changed the car, 
but it wasn't all the changes, it was the track, too," he explained.  "We 
just missed the setup a little bit.  It was loose going in, loose going 
through and loose coming out.  We've got some homework to do before the start 
of the race to make sure we have a car that's easy to drive."

red-eye arrival

Terry Borcheller arrived in time for the second practice session on Thursday, 
after flying all night from Las Vegas.  He was in Nevada for the SEMA 
automotive trade show, where he represented his personal sponsor, K&N 
Performance Filters.

kart coach

Niclas Jönsson has realized mutiple benefits from his purchase of a shifter 
kart earlier this season.  In addition to honing his race performance, he has 
found business opportunities coaching rookie drivers.  He recently eased his 
new students through their first major competition, in Las Vegas.