Petit Le Mans IMSA: Mazda wins race, AXR Cadillac takes title
A tense final couple of hours saw Harry Tincknell claim Petit Le Mans victory for Mazda in the team’s final IMSA race, while Felipe Nasr held off a hard-charging Ricky Taylor to claim the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship title for himself and Pipo Derani.
Green flag stops around the 100min-to-go mark left the Meyer Shank Racing Acura of Juan Pablo Montoya barely leading ahead of Nasr in the Action Express Racing Cadillac, but the other Acura of Wayne Taylor Racing, now with Taylor at the wheel, fell off the track on cold tires on his out lap, and dropped to fourth.
Then Nasr dived past Montoya at Turn 1 and edged away, with the MSR driver left to fend off the Mazda driven by Oliver Jarvis. Kamui Kobayashi ran fifth in the second AXR Cadillac, ahead of the JDC-Miller MotorSports Cadillac driven by Sebastien Bourdais.
The next round of stops saw Jarvis hand off to Tincknell who got held up by traffic on his out-lap and briefly dropped a whole lap behind the AXR leader, but when Meyer Shank Racing replaced Montoya with Helio Castroneves, Tincknell had the pace to ensure the MSR car came out behind him. Tincknell then pulled away from the four-time Indy 500 winner to try and hunt down Nasr.
With 54mins to go, Castroneves pitted off-sequence and it was a long stop that allowed Renger van der Zande in the Ganassi Cadillac into fifth. IMSA Radio reported that the #60 car’s floor was damaged, and the car was sent back to the paddock, where it joined another Prototype retirement, the JDC-Miller car which had retired half an hour earlier with a fractured exhaust manifold.
With 50mins to go, attention turned once more to the lead battle as Tincknell was all over the rear of Nasr’s Cadillac, and with 37mins to go they pitted together, 1sec apart.
The AXR team changed only Nasr’s rears, and he dropped it on his out lap, but was saved from losing track position to Tincknell because the Mazda had made its previous stop earlier so required more fuel. That also persuaded Multimatic to change all four tires on the RT24-P. Taylor was another driver who had a mild off exiting the pits, so the efforts of the WTR team getting him out ahead of the Mazda were nullified.
With half an hour to go, Nasr’s lead was 4.3sec, while Tincknell had six seconds in hand over Taylor who had a four second margin over Kobayashi.
Then with under 22mins to go, Tincknell closed on Nasr when the ex-F1 driver got held up by GT traffic in Turn 6 and then pounced up the inside at Turn 7 and boxed the Cadillac in behind another GT car. Tincknell didn’t immediately escape – suffering the same traffic issues – but eventually eased clear to claim victory for himself, Jarvis and Jonathan Bomarito on Mazda's farewell.
Meanwhile, Nasr had to watch his mirrors for his title rival Taylor with 15mins to go. Whoever finished ahead would win the championship, and blue-and-black WTR Acura was only 1.5sec down.
It became a real nail-biter as the trio made their way through traffic, occasionally Nasr looking like he might be able to reclaim the lead. But he played it smart when traffic finally separated him from the lead Mazda with two laps to go and he focused on holding off Taylor.
Taylor made an impossible dive down the inside of the AXR Caddy at the Turn 10 chicane on the final lap but outbraked himself and went skipping over the sandtrap. As he rejoined the track, Nasr regained his runner-up spot and so sealed the title for himself and Derani.
Kobayashi brought home the second AXR Cadillac in fourth ahead of the lapped Ganassi car.
GTLM: Corvette trouble gives Porsche 1-2
A tough battle between Nick Tandy’s Corvette C8.R and the Porsche 911 RSRs of Kevin Estre and Mathieu Jaminet saw contact that sent Estre to the pits off-sequence for a checkover. That meant that when his rivals stopped, Estre was left with a 15sec lead, but Jaminet fell away from Tandy’s tail leaving Augusto Farfus’ BMW M8 as the ’Vette’s primary chaser.
However, following the final round of stops, Estre’s lead was down to 5.5sec, and Jaminet was up to third, ahead of Farfus. But Tandy dropped to 7.5sec behind Estre with 30mins to go.
As he was defending from Jaminet with 10mins to go, Tandy had contact with the leading Mazda, which broke the car’s right-front suspension and he had to limp to the pits and retire.
Thus WeatherTech Racing scored a surprise 1-2, but Estre eased off the gas to allow the full-time car, the #79 of Jaminet, Matt Campbell and Cooper MacNeil, to take the win.
GTD: Aston wins, Pfaff gets title
Ross Gunn’s Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 started the final couple of hours leading Laurens Vanthoor in the Pfaff Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R, chased by Daniel Morad in the Alegra Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3, Spencer Pumpelly’s Magnus with Archangel Motorsport Acura NSX GT3 and Zach Veach in the #12 Lexus RC F of Vasser Sullivan Racing.
Trent Hindman was pulled in slightly early, so Wright Motorsports could install Jan Heylen in the car. That wasn’t the golden bullet that could overcome the car that hadn’t handled right since its earlier troubles, and instead the class looked like a pure duel between Gunn and Vanthoor.
With a half hour to go, it was the Aston Martin ahead by a handsome margin of 15sec, with Vanthoor 40sec ahead of Veach who had 12sec in hand over Morad. Gunn held on to take the win in the car he shares with Ian James and Roman de Angelis, but second was good enough for Vanthoor and Pfaff teammate Zach Robichon to claim GTD title honors.
Lally had an off that dropped him to sixth behind Heylen, who was a lap down.
LMP2 and LMP3: Tower, Riley take class wins
PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports looked as if it would win LMP2, with Mikkel Jensen putting in a brilliant couple of stints in the car he shares with Ben Keating and Scott Huffaker. But a post-race penalty allowed Tower Motorsport trio Gabriel Aubry, John Farano and James French to take the victory.
In LMP3, Felipe Fraga, together with Gar Robinson and Scott Andrews, ensured Riley Motorsports remained ahead of the Jr III Racing driven by Garett Grist, Spencer Pigot and Art Balogh.
Race results:
Cla | Class | Num | Driver | Chassis | Laps | Gap |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
1 | DPi | 55 | Oliver Jarvis Harry Tincknell Jonathan Bomarito |
Mazda DPi | 410 | |
2 | DPi | 31 | Felipe Nasr Mike Conway Pipo Derani |
Cadillac DPi | 410 | 3.297 |
3 | DPi | 10 | Ricky Taylor Filipe Albuquerque Alexander Rossi |
Acura DPi | 410 | 3.702 |
4 | DPi | 48 | Jimmie Johnson Kamui Kobayashi Simon Pagenaud |
Cadillac DPi | 410 | 30.681 |
5 | DPi | 01 | Renger van der Zande Kevin Magnussen Scott Dixon |
Cadillac DPi | 409 | 1 Lap |
6 | LMP2 | 8 | John Farano Gabriel Aubry James French |
ORECA LMP2 07 | 407 | 3 Laps |
7 | LMP2 | 52 | Ben Keating Mikkel Jensen Scott Huffaker |
ORECA LMP2 07 | 407 | 3 Laps |
8 | LMP2 | 11 | Thomas Steven Tristan Nunez Thomas Merrill |
ORECA LMP2 07 | 406 | 4 Laps |
9 | LMP2 | 22 | Jim McGuire Wayne Boyd Guy Smith |
ORECA LMP2 07 | 405 | 5 Laps |
10 | DPi | 60 | Dane Cameron Helio Castroneves Juan Pablo Montoya |
Acura DPi | 399 | 11 Laps |
11 | LMP3 | 74 | Gar Robinson Felipe Fraga Scott Andrews |
Ligier JS P320 | 391 | 19 Laps |
12 | LMP3 | 30 | Ari Balogh Garett Grist Spencer Pigot |
Ligier JS P320 | 390 | 20 Laps |
13 | GTLM | 79 | Cooper MacNeil Mathieu Jaminet Matt Campbell |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | 390 | 20 Laps |
14 | GTLM | 97 | Kevin Estre Michael Christensen Frédéric Makowiecki |
Porsche 911 RSR - 19 | 390 | 20 Laps |
15 | GTLM | 24 | John Edwards Jesse Krohn Augusto Farfus |
BMW M8 GTE | 389 | 21 Laps |
16 | LMP3 | 91 | Jim Cox Dylan Murry Jeroen Bleekemolen |
Ligier JS P320 | 387 | 23 Laps |
GTLM | 4 | Tommy Milner Nick Tandy Alexander Sims |
Corvette C8.R | 381 | 29 Laps | |
18 | LMP3 | 40 | Todd Archer James Vance Max Hanratty |
Duqueine D08 | 381 | 29 Laps |
19 | GTD | 23 | Roman De Angelis Ross Gunn Ian James |
Aston Martin Vantage GT3 | 378 | 32 Laps |
20 | GTD | 9 | Zacharie Robichon Laurens Vanthoor Lars Kern |
Porsche 911 GT3 R | 378 | 32 Laps |
21 | GTD | 12 | Frankie Montecalvo Zach Veach Robert Megennis |
Lexus RC F GT3 | 377 | 33 Laps |
22 | GTD | 28 | Daniel Morad Michael de Quesada Daniel Juncadella |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 377 | 33 Laps |
23 | GTD | 16 | Trent Hindman Patrick Long Jan Heylen |
Porsche 911 GT3 R | 376 | 34 Laps |
24 | GTD | 44 | John Potter Andy Lally Spencer Pumpelly |
Acura NSX GT3 | 376 | 34 Laps |
25 | GTD | 1 | Bryan Sellers Madison Snow Corey Lewis |
Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 365 | 45 Laps |
26 | GTD | 88 | Rob Ferriol Katherine Legge Andrew Davis |
Porsche 911 GT3 R | 359 | 51 Laps |
27 | LMP3 | 7 | Rodrigo Pflucker Mark Kvamme Stefan Rzadzinski |
Duqueine D08 | 356 | 54 Laps |
DPi | 5 | Tristan Vautier Loic Duval Sébastien Bourdais |
Cadillac DPi | 341 | 69 Laps | |
29 | LMP3 | 2 | Niklas Krütten Tom Gamble Andrew Meyrick |
Ligier JS P320 | 308 | 102 Laps |
30 | GTD | 42 | Don Yount Jaden Conwright Benja Hites |
Audi R8 LMS GT3 | 286 | 124 Laps |
LMP3 | 54 | Jon Bennett George Kurtz Colin Braun |
Ligier JS P320 | 285 | 125 Laps | |
GTLM | 25 | Connor de Phillippi Philipp Eng Bruno Spengler |
BMW M8 GTE | 281 | 129 Laps | |
LMP3 | 83 | Matthew Bell Naveen Rao Josh Skelton |
Duqueine D08 | 244 | 166 Laps | |
LMP3 | 38 | Dan Goldburg Rasmus Lindh Malthe Jakobsen |
Ligier JS P320 | 208 | 202 Laps | |
LMP3 | 36 | Jarett Andretti Josh Burdon Oliver Askew |
Ligier JS P320 | 153 | 257 Laps | |
GTLM | 3 | Antonio Garcia Jordan Taylor Nick Catsburg |
Corvette C8.R | 150 | 260 Laps | |
GTD | 96 | Bill Auberlen Robby Foley Aidan Read |
BMW M6 GT3 | 150 | 260 Laps | |
GTD | 57 | Russell Ward Philip Ellis Maro Engel |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 147 | 263 Laps | |
GTD | 70 | Brendan Iribe Frederik Schandorff Ben Barnicoat |
McLaren 720S GT3 | 146 | 264 Laps | |
GTD | 19 | Mikhail Goikhberg Franck Perera Michele Beretta |
Lamborghini Huracan GT3 | 146 | 264 Laps | |
GTD | 32 | Mike Skeen Guy Cosmo Stevan McAleer |
Mercedes-AMG GT3 | 146 | 264 Laps | |
GTD | 14 | Aaron Telitz Jack Hawksworth Kyle Kirkwood |
Lexus RC F GT3 | 146 | 264 Laps | |
LMP2 | 18 | Dwight Merriman Kyle Tilley Ryan Dalziel |
ORECA LMP2 07 | 21 | 389 Laps | |
View full results |
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