BRASELTON, GA  (September 29, 2011) – 16-year-old Atlanta native Sean Rayhall joined the Cooper Tires Prototype Lites Championship this weekend at his home track of Road Atlanta and took advantage of that local knowledge, taking the pole position for today’s Round 13, part of the Petit Le Mans weekend.

In Lites 2, Scott Tucker continued his run of top spots in the prototype development series of the American Le Mans Series presented by Tequila Patrón, taking the pole position ahead of Michal Chlumecky.

Rayhall, who has spent several years in karting and formula cars, put his #77 Comprent Motorsports/SCCA Élan DP02 on the pole early in the 30-minute session with a time of 1:19.836 and never relinquished the spot.

“This is the second weekend in the car,” said Rayhall. “The team gave me a great car from the beginning. This is a great series and I’m stoked to be here! It’s very big for us to get P1 in our debut. I’m going to focus on my execution during the race and try to stay on top. I have a great car, the only thing that can bring us down is me, so I’ll try not to let the team down!”                                                                                                                                                        

Ricardo Vera, behind the wheel of the #37 Intersport Racing Élan DP02, has a 15-point lead over Eurosport Racing’s Antonio Downs and 22 points over Comprent Motorsports’ Jonathan Gore. Starting second while Downs starts sixth and Gore starts seventh puts the 18-year-old Vera that much closer to the title.

“The team did a good job with the car, so we have a great car for the race,” said Vera. “We starting ahead of Antonio and Jonathan, so we have to keep the car on the track and stay on the podium and hopefully clinch the championship.”

A wrench was thrown into the Lites 2 works during Tuesday’s promoter’s test day, when L2 champion Robert Sabato took a hard hit coming out of turn 12. Suffering a broken right hand in addition to a badly damaged West WR1000, Sabato will sit out the race weekend, leaving his competitors to battle it out for the top spot Sabato has occupied so often on his way to a record-setting nine victories. Level 5 Motorsports’ Scott Tucker took advantage of Sabato’s absence, taking his third straight Lites 2 pole with a time of 1:25.178, just ahead of Sabato’s 6th Gear Racing teammate, Michal Chlumecky.

The Prototype Lites mission is two-fold: present an opportunity for semi-professional race car drivers to compete in a world-class environment while also providing an avenue for drivers to move up the ladder into the LMPC or LMP classes in the American Le Mans Series Presented by Tequila Patrón. The series is divided into two classes: Lites 1, featuring the Élan DP02 chassis, powered by a 2.3-liter, four-cylinder Mazda MP2 engine; and Lites 2, utilizing the West WX10 and WR1000 chassis, with either a Kawasaki ZX10R or a Suzuki GSXR motor.

The Cooper Tires Prototype Lites Championship will have two 30-minute races during the Petit Le Mans weekend at Road Atlanta – Thursday at 12:50pm and Friday at 9:15am. Visit www.prototypelites.com for live timing and scoring and updates throughout the race weekend.

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