Indianapolis is shaded with grey skies as the countdown draws closer to the 5:45pm race start for the Brickyard Grand Prix – the big question will be – will it rain?

While unlike the Sprint Cup and Nationwide competition that will take place here this weekend – the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship will go on regardless of the weather.

The race strategy however if inclement weather strikes could be turned upside down. The ability of the engineers to read the judge the weather radar reports could be just as important as their driver’s skills behind the wheel.

Indy 500 veterans Christian Fittipaldi and Bruno Junqueira (pictured right), Scott Sharp, Scott Pruett, Townsend Bell, Martin Plowman and this year’s rookies Sage Karam, Jack Hawksworth and James Davison should be used to waiting for rain here in Indy. Of that line-up – two of them have been on pole here for the Indy 500 – Sharp in 2001 and Junqueira in 2002.

In today’s the final 15 minute warm-up it was the Corvette DP machines which topped the times in the Prototype class with Richard Westbrook leading Ricky Taylor and Joao Barbosa.

TUDOR Championship rookie Hawksworth topped the times in PC for the first time. The Bryan Herta Autosport IndyCar racer is making his sportscar debut here this weekend.

In the GTLM class it was time for the Vipers to shine with Jonathan Bomarito leading Dominik Farnbacher.

Dominik’s brother Mario was also fast in GTD – topped the timesheets aboard his Porsche.

Today’s race kicks off at 5:45pm with the Fox Sports 1 broadcast beginning at 5:30pm IMSA.com will provide coverage with on-board cameras, live timing and scoring as well as the MRN Radio broadcast.

Top three in class (overall in parentheses):
(1) #90-P Richard Westbrook (Corvette DP) 1:18.990
(2) #10-P Ricky Taylor (Corvette DP) 1:19.407 (0.417-)
(3) #5-P Joao Barbosa (Corvette DP) 1:19.417 (0.427-)

(9) #08-PC Jack Hawksworth (Oreca FLM 09 Chevrolet) 1:21.265
(10) #52-PC Frankie Montecalvo (Oreca FLM 09 Chevrolet) 1:21.639 (0.374-)
(11) #25-PC Sean Rayhall (Oreca FLM 09 Chevrolet) 1:21.882 (0.617-)

(19) #93-GTLM Jonathan Bomarito (Dodge Viper SRT) 1:23.451
(21) #91-GTLM Dominik Farnbacher (Dodge Viper SRT) 1:23.648 (0.197-)
(22) #56-GTLM Dirk Mueller (BMW Z4 GTE) 1:23.679 (0.228-)

(30) #23-GTD Mario Farnbacher (Porsche 911 GT America) 1:26.693
(31) #555-GTD Townsend Bell (Ferrari F458 Italia) 1:26.866 (0.173-)
(32) #22-GTD Cooper MacNeil (Porsche 911 GT America) 1:26.931 (0.238-)