Muscle Milk star Lucas Luhr may be a rookie on the streets of Baltimore but that didn’t show in qualifying today for the latest round of the American Le Mans Series.

Luhr improved throughout the session to finally set his fastest time of 1:25.174 on his ninth lap of the Baltimore street circuit.

The Muscle Milk HPD entry was .74 of a second faster than Road America winner Guy Smith.

Last year Luhr had to miss the weekend while on duty as a factory driver for Nissan in the World GT1 Championship – a series title he clinched with 2012 Le Mans Nissan DeltaWing pilot, Michael Krumm.

Now part of the HPD family, Luhr and teammate Klaus Graff have taken five victories so far this year and hold a 12 point lead in the ALMS P1 championship.

“You don’t just jump right into it. The track improves every lap and you build up to it, a little bit here, a little bit there and then you have nice lap,” Luhr said.

“This morning the car was bouncing and jumping and doing all kinds of crazy stuff. It was like the car didn’t like me and was trying to throw me out.”

“We made lot of changes. Brendan and the team basically turned the car set-up upside down, we changed so many things and then it was pretty good.

“You never have  a perfect race car. There are always a few things you can make a little better. A little bit here, a little bit there. I think we will find a few things to improve tonight and hopefully the car will be even better for the race.”