DANVILLE, Va. (Aug. 28, 2015) – Matt McMurry beat out JDC Motorsports teammates Kenton Koch and Clark Toppe to capture the pole for Round 11 of the Cooper Tires Prototype Lites Powered by Mazda with a lap of 1 minute, 19.511 seconds Friday at VIRginia International Raceway.

McMurry, from Phoenix, earned his fourth pole of the 2015 season in the No. 20 JDC Motorsports entry in the International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) Official Development Series.

“It’s great to be up on the pole again,” McMurry said. “We’ve actually been having more trouble setting up the car than usual. Thankfully for qualifying it was much better than it has been today or yesterday.”

Round 11 starts at 9:20 a.m. (ET) Saturday, Aug. 29 followed by Round 12 at 3 p.m.

The series is racing on the 14-turn, 2.25-mile North Course since Prototype Lites is racing on the same weekend as the Biscuitville 125 for the NASCAR K&N Pro Series East. This is the first time for many of the drivers on the North Course instead of the Full Course.

“I’ve been to VIR, but the North track is new to me,” McMurry said. “I think the race tomorrow will be interesting with the traffic. Most of the tracks are big enough to where you really don’t catch up to the back of the pack for a while. Here it’s such a short track and there’s still such a big time gap between the front and the back that we’ll probably catch them within the first few laps based on qualifying. It should be interesting to see how that plays out.”

Lites 1 championship leader Koch took one more step toward clinching the Lites 1 title by qualifying second for Round 11 at 1:19.725 in the No. 60 JDC Motorsports entry. He led both practices Friday and recorded the quickest time of the day in the first practice, 1:18.922.

Koch, from Glendora, California, leads the championship by 54 points over Toppe, who was third quickest in qualifying. Koch needs to lead by 60 points after Round 11 or 40 points after Round 12 to clinch the championship.

Robert Alon, from Encino, California, was fourth overall in qualifying at 1:20.322 in the No. 00 Performance Tech Motorsports entry. His teammate Austin Versteeg, from Sandy, Utah, rounded out the top five at 1:20.846.

Lites 1 Masters Championship leader John Falb was the top Masters qualifier at 1:21.259 in the No. 77 ONE Motorsports car, good for sixth overall.

Two-time defending Lites 2 champion and points leader Brian Alder, from Dublin, Ohio, was the top L2 qualifier at 1:22.556 in the No. 22 BAR1 Motorsports entry.

For more information about Cooper Tires Prototype Lites Powered by Mazda weekend at VIR, visit www.imsa.com, follow the hashtags #CTPL and #AcessVIR on Twitter and like IMSA on Facebook.