TAYLOR: An Amazing Road America

Eight Races down and two to go. Coming into Road America we were back in a must-win situation for the championship.

Winning the championship was within our control if we could win both races so we knew this weekend was all about putting the pressure on our biggest competitors to and do our best to win the race to close the gap before Petit Le Mans.

On top of that Road America was a racetrack where Wayne Taylor Racing has never found victory, and longtime team member Bill Mullen has also never won here after 36 years of racing. There were many reasons to go full attack this weekend.

This weekend, it was Filipe’s turn to qualify and the race prediction was for full wet. So a lot of emphasis, as usual, went into preparing a strong qualifying car.

Filipe was on amazing form this weekend and we tried a few different philosophies with the car to get the most out of it for qualifying. It seemed as if we had a very good car but the Cadillacs from Chip Ganassi Racing were going to be hard to beat so we would have to execute a perfect lap.

When qualifying came around, there was a lot of strategy around what car to present and how to manage the 15 minutes to give ourselves the best shot at the pole position as possible.

Filipe knew he had to nail the lap to have a chance to beat the Cadillacs. Immediately in the session, Filipe was flying, watching the live telemetry he was going quicker than any of the qualifying simulations throughout the weekend.

The first lap was incredible, but the next two were even faster! The Cadillacs waited and went out one lap after us so it was nerve wracking to see how they would measure up, one lap off sequence. Trying to gauge what Filipe’s first, second, and third timed laps were and comparing them to what the 02 car was doing, we realized we had a great shot at it and Filipe’s lap was looking good.

It held off. Filipe’s lap was two-tenths up on the field and a whole nine-tenths ahead of the third-place car. It was one of the best qualifying laps I’ve seen! An awesome lap.

The race was still looking wet but we opted not to reinvent the car because the rain chances had gone down and we were afraid of the track drying out and being stuck with a wet setup.

Filipe started the car from the pole and jumped away to an early lead. It wasn’t easy, however. The mist started to form and it turned into a drizzle, then a heavy drizzle. But the track stayed green and the cars were keeping it dry.

The yellow eventually came out and it was in the window for everyone. This was the time we had planned to do our driver change but the difficult decision was whether or not we would take rain tires or not.

We opted for slicks because it looked like the rain would pass and it hadn’t really picked up since the previous run, where the pace was basically dry pace.

As we were under yellow and trying to put some temperature into the tires the track looked quite wet, but with tire temperature, sometimes it can be surprising how long you can run slicks.

When we went back to green I immediately had wheel spin and lost the lead going down the front straight to Bourdais.

The track was wet and extremely slippery on the slicks, the 5 car (which opted for wets) went flying by as if I was standing still. But we had to survive this until the track started to dry (it never did). Even the LMP2 and LMP3 cars that opted for wets were passing the rest of the prototype field on slicks.

It was quite an awkward stint of trying to survive, versus keep in touch and not lose time, versus balancing top speed versus cornering speed differentials with the slower class cars on wets. We were losing a lot of time to the 5 car (and the 60 which bailed from slicks and more downforce early) so we finally pitted for rains.

The next stint was spent on wets, driving around by ourselves trying to stay out of trouble until the next caution to catch back up. It was much easier to drive the car but we were almost a lap down at this point, so desperately needed a caution.

The caution finally came out and we packed up in our fourth-place spot behind the 5, 60 and 01. It looked like the track would finally start to dry under this caution. The rain had stopped, and it was starting to dry.

The thought entered my head that Filipe had been so strong all weekend and there was still a long way to go. They asked me if I wanted to go until the end, but I told them Filipe was the guy for the job.

We did the driver change and got back out in our fourth place spot behind the same three cars with about 1 hour and 20 minutes to go.

On the next run Filipe was able to pass the 60 car with a fantastic move into Turn 1, catching them off-guard on the brakes. The next stint was spent chasing the 5 and 01, while all of the teams were preparing what to do on the final stop, which would likely determine the outcome of the race.

Another yellow came out and all teams opted to come to pit lane. The order completely shuffled as the leading Cadillacs opted for four tires and the Acuras took less. So the Acuras jumped to the front with the current order: 60-10-01-02-5.

So it was a championship showdown once again where we were in a situation where we had to get by the 60 but with as little risk as possible because we still wanted to preserve a win for Acura.

With their extra downforce that they took for the rain, we had a top speed advantage but at Road America it is very difficult to follow closely behind other prototype class cars.

Filipe had one very good look going into turn one, but the 60 was ready and Filipe had to go the long way around. He settled in and had to wait for an opportunity in traffic.

Going into Turn 7 a few laps later, the 60 caught a GT which balked his momentum. Filipe took his opportunity and fully committed to the left side of the GT as the 60 went to the right. The gap closed on the left but Filipe stayed committed and had to put two wheels in the grass to squeeze past, putting himself to the left of the 60 car, which is the inside for Turn 8, gaining the position!

From that point, we knew the race was ours, Filipe had the pace advantage over the 60, so without any further traffic issues he would control the race to the end.

There were one or two good opportunities for the 60 to take a look at Filipe but he always placed his car in a way that he couldn’t be compromised by GT cars.

With about eight minutes to go, the 60, in a heated battle with the 02, lost the car in the Kink and slammed the wall. It looked like their race was over but he managed to keep the car going in fourth place.

From that point on it was survival for them, to not pit and to finish the race under caution. For us, we were able to cruise to victory under the safety car!

It was a wonderful win and an amazing way to take the championship lead before the final round at Petit Le Mans.

Bill Mullen finally got his Road America win to complete the list of tracks with a race win. He’s now won every race on the IMSA schedule at least once.

Once again, the championship comes down to Petit Le Mans where we have been before. At this point last year it was a very similar position with us and the 31, but the 31 had the points lead.

This year it is us in the lead and we know what we have to do to finish the season off.

The Black Pearl, The Steam Frigate, The John Boat, The Catamaran, The Battleship, The Scientific Research Vessel, we are going for all of them.