Matteo Malucelli’s teammate is one of the winningest drivers in American Le Mans Series history but if today’s performance by is anything to go by, it won’t be long before he joins Olivier Beretta in the winner’s circle.

In only his third ever American Le Mans Series start, Maucelli scored the GT class pole today, holding off the impressive debut from CORE autopsort’s new Porsche assault with Patrick Long at the wheel.

The result continued Risi’s successful return to ALMS competition with its second pole of the season in only three races. The Houston-based squad took a sabatical in 2012 – skipping the entire ALMS season.

“It was fantastic for me as it was my first qualifying and my first pole in ALMS,” Malucelli said.

“Laguna is a difficult track so I’m really happy and want to say thank you to the Risi team and Michelin as the car was really good. For sure we have the best position for the race tomorrow and will fight for the win.”

The Italian comes to California fresh from a GTE victory in the WEC 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium, in another Ferrari 458 Italia

“For the first half hour on Thursday it was quite difficult adapting to the track as it was my first time here and there were many cars; I had to watch the mirrors a lot but after that first 30 minutes it was okay. It’s a bit slower than I expected but so far everything is going well and we will now see what happens tomorrow.”