Daytona, Florida – The two new BMW M6 GTLM racing cars will start the 54th annual 24 Hours of Daytona (US), the opening round of the 2016 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship (IWSC), from the third and sixth positions in the GTLM field.

This afternoon’s 15-minute qualifying session was held under rainy skies making for the wettest track of the day and very difficult conditions. A red flag for a competitor’s crash halted the action after only four cars completed two timed laps, but, as a minimum of ten minutes of green flag time is required by the rules, the session became a slippery two-lap shootout.

With a 2:02.497-minute lap around the 3.56-mile Daytona International Speedway road course, John Edwards (US) qualified the number 100 BMW M6 GTLM in third position, just over one second slower than the pole sitting number 911 Porsche. Edwards will share the car with Lucas Luhr (DE), Graham Rahal (US) and Kuno Wittmer (CA).

Dirk Werner (DE) qualified the number 25 BMW M6 GTLM in sixth spot with a time of 2:03.974 minutes. Werner will co-drive with Bill Auberlen (US), Augusto Farfus (BR) and Bruno Spengler (CA). The talented quartet finished second in last year’s Daytona 24-hour race, finishing only 0.478 seconds behind the GTLM class winner after 725 laps of battle.

In the 21-car GTD class, Markus Paltalla (FI) qualified the number 97 Turner Motorsport BMW M6 GT3 13th, while Jens Klingmann came 16th in the number 96 car.

Bobby Rahal (Team Principal, BMW Team RLL):

“Those were tough conditions and I am very pleased with the job John did. He really did not have much time in the car. I thought we were going to be P2. Third is a good place to start the race and Dirk isn’t that far behind. Really, where you qualify for this race makes no difference but it is just nice to see that the BMW M6 GTLM was competitive in the wet.”

John Edwards (Number 100 BMW M6 GTLM, 3rd place):

“In a brand new car it would have been cool to go out and get pole position, but that didn’t happen. Those were really poor conditions. We knew it would be tough, but I think we have a car in the BMW M6 GTLM that can handle the rain better than the BMW Z4 GTLM. Even with a little mistake in turn six on my best lap, we weren’t that far off the Porsches. I look at this as progress and right now we have a safe starting position for the long 24 hour race.”

Dirk Werner (Number 25 BMW M6 GTLM, 6th place):

“Every corner was an adventure, as there was a lot of water on the track and it was easy to go off. I am just happy we had a clean qualifying. P6 is all right, we are in the middle of the field and I think we have a good car for the race.”