LEXINGTON, Ohio (Sept. 24, 2020) – Two weeks ago, Gresham Wagner (No. 5 Spark Performance) won his first race in the Mazda MX-5 Cup presented by BFGoodrich® Tires® at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. Thursday, he began his quest for win number two by turning the quickest lap in practice.

Wagner’s lap of 1:36.851 was a far cry from the qualifying lap record (1:35.3177) he set at Mid-Ohio two weeks ago, but the conditions are different. Weather and tire rubber laid down by other racing series will make Rounds Seven and Eight subtly different from two weeks ago.

“I think it’ll be slightly different,” Wagner said. “Every session is a different temperature, different rubber, so I don’t think you’ll ever get identical conditions back to back. You really need to approach this like it’s a new race track. That can be tricky, because you think you know what you want to do, having been here already, but when you get out there you have to take a step back and realize that everything changes and you might need to do something different than the last one.”

Championship leader Robert Noaker (No. 13 Copeland Motorsports) was second fastest in practice, followed by another Mid-Ohio race winner: Michael Carter in the No. 08 Carter Racing Enterprises machine.

Following another round of practice and then qualifying on Friday, the first Mazda MX-5 Cup race of the weekend will go green at 4:05pm ET. Race two is set for Saturday at 8:50am. Live timing is available at www.mx-5cup.com.