AXR’s Aitken, Bamber Take Controlling Detroit Win

Photo: Geoff Miller/IMSA

Action Express Racing broke through for its first IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship victory of the season, with Earl Bamber and Jack Aitken taking a controlling win in Saturday’s Chevrolet Sports Car Classic.

Aitken drove the No. 31 Cadillac V-Series.R to a 6.023-second win over the No. 25 Team WRT BMW M Hybrid V8 of Philipp Eng in the 100-minute race that resulted in two late-race yellow and restarts.

The Whelen Engineering-sponsored Cadillac led from green, thanks to an ideal getaway from pole-sitter Bamber, who stretched out a lead over the No. 93 Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-06 of Nick Yelloly, as the No. 40 Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac of Louis Deletraz drooped back to fourth.

A mid-race stop, where the No. 31 Cadillac took on fresh right-side Michelin tires, kept Aitken out front for the remainder of the contest.

With the win, Aitken took over the GTP points lead, following a race to forget for the No. 5 JDC-Miller Motorsports Porsche 963 of Laurin Heinrich, whose car served multiple penalties, including a stop-and-hold plus 60-second infraction for pinching the No. 23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Valkyrie of Roman De Angelis into the wall.

Heinrich entered the weekend with the points lead after winning three of the first four races between two Porsche entries.

Both Eng’s co-driver Marco Wittmann, as well as the third-placed finishing No. 10 WTR Cadillac and No. 6 Penske Porsche, ran long before making their first-and-only pit stops, which ultimately put them ahead of the No. 93 MSR Acura of Yelloly and Renger van der Zande, which ultimately finished fourth.

A miscue for Laurens Vanthoor, who was attempting to overtake Eng in Turn 3 for second with 26 minutes to go dropped the No. 6 Porsche out of a podium result, then a damaged rear wing and diffuser after contact from his brother, Dries, in the No. 24 BMW, led to a mechanical black flag for the elder Vanthoor.

Dries Vanthoor, meanwhile, was handed drive-through penalty for incident responsibility, which was served just seconds before the third and final yellow and resulted in an eighth place result.

Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque to a season-best third place finish.

GTD Pro class honors went to the No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R of Alexander Sims and Antonio Garcia, in a similar flag-to-flag run to the overall winning Cadillac.

Garcia finished 1.935 seconds ahead of the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Lamborghini Temerario GT3 of Andrea Caldarelli after multiple late-race incidents for a variety of cars.

More to come…

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John