Photo: Brett Farmer/IMSA
***The No. 10 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Acura pairing of Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque broke a 664-day winless streak with victory in Saturday’s Chevrolet Detroit Sports Car Challenge, marking their first wins in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTP era.
***It marked the fifth different winning driver lineup in the top class in as many races this season, following victories by the No. 7 Penske Porsche 963 (Rolex 24), No. 40 WTRAndretti Acura (Sebring), No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac V-Series.R (Long Beach) and No. 6 Penske Porsche (WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca).
***Taylor and Albuquerque were awarded winning trophies with Cadillac prototype models attached. “It’s a bit ironic to come over to the home of Cadillac and win in front of them,” Albuquerque said. “We have these beautiful trophies with the Cadillac model. We took a Cadillac home. It’s quite ironic but it shows that in racing nothing is what’s expected to be.”
***Acura, meanwhile, scored its fifth win in Detroit. “The weekend demonstrated a constant progression in performance from everyone involved throughout the event,” said HRC US IMSA program manager Lee Niffenegger. “In the race, we enjoyed perfect execution right from the green flag to the checkered. Congratulations to everyone at HRC and WTRAndretti on a job well done.”
***The No. 6 Penske Porsche battled radio issues during pole-sitter Nick Tandy’s opening stint, which impacted the car’s strategy according to the Englishman, who along with co-driver Mathieu Jaminet finished second following Taylor’s late-race pass.
***Tandy said: “Not long into the stint I started having radio issues. We have protocol if we lose radio, so the driver has some idea of what lap you’re on or energy consumed in GTP. The trouble with no radio is that your’e going to miss the opportunity to pit before a yellow or something like this, so I was getting a little stressed out because we had an early yellow in the race and this messed up my energy numbers in the car.”
***Tandy took full responsibility for contact with the No. 35 Conquest Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 of Albert Costa Balboa, which resulted in a drive-through penalty. “It was a race of what ifs but it could have been a lot worse than what we ended up with in P2,” Tandy added.
***Ironically, the penalty only cost the No. 6 Porsche roughly ten seconds due to the location of pit lane in correlation to the race track.
***After the No. 01 CGR Cadillac won Long Beach by double stinting its Michelin soft compound tires, nearly the entire GTP field followed the same strategy in Saturday’s race.
***The 100-minute contest featured five full-course cautions, mostly for incidents between GTP cars. Connor De Phillippi crashed his No. 25 Team RLL BMW M Hybrid twice on consecutive laps, while JDC-Miller Motorsports’ Richard Westbrook got turned around by the No. 31 Action Express Racing Cadillac of Jack Aitken, resulting in a blocked track and a drive-through for Aitken.
***Aitken was also involved in an incident with the No. 5 Proton Competition Porsche of Gianmaria Bruni, although no action was taken by race control.
***Westbrook said: “To be honest, the track is not suitable for racing with prototypes in the top GTP class. It was like being in a bumper car. The damage to the vehicles worsened lap by lap. It was unacceptable – simply unacceptable. I found it frustrating. I have such fond memories of the times we competed on the beautiful Belle Isle in Detroit.”
***With their fourth place finish on Saturday, after rebounding from a right-rear puncture, Porsche Penske’s Dane Cameron and Felipe Nasr hold a 70-point lead over CGR’s Renger van der Zande and Sebastien Bourdais, with Tandy and Jaminet just 13 points further behind in third, heading into the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen.
***AO Racing’s Laurin Heinrich and Seb Priaulx, meanwhile, extended their lead in the GTD Pro class standings to 84 points over the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 duo of Jack Hawksworth and Ben Barnicoat, who finished runner-up in the race despite sustaining extensive nose damage from Barnicoat’s clash with the No. 4 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R of Nicky Catsburg while battling for the class lead.
***Hawksworth said: “Ben did a good job bringing it home with quite a bit of damage on the car and we’ll come out of here with a second-place finish.”
***The class pole-sitting No. 3 Corvette of Antonio Garcia pitted on the opening lap with alternator failure, just as Harry Tincknell’s No. 64 Multimatic Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3 came to a halt on track with a broken driveshaft, which triggered the first yellow.
***While both cars returned to action following repairs, the sister No. 65 Mustang GT3 of Dirk Mueller lost a lap due to repairs due to contact with another car during a wave-by after opting for an alternate pit strategy that saw Joey Hand relinquish controls of the car after just ten minutes of the race.
***Mueller explained: “Everything was running in our favor until, during a safety car, I got on the front-stretch for a pass around situation. I commenced the pass around, as instructed, and a competitor slipped – I think he was warming up the tires.. I tried to accelerate around it, but unfortunately he made contact with my left-rear corner. That destroyed our race.”
***The No. 15 Vasser Sullivan Lexus of Frankie Montecalvo and Parker Thompson, which finished fourth in class, opted for the same early pit stop strategy.
***All four WeatherTech Championship classes return to action next up at Watkins Glen, on June 21-23, which will also mark the third round of the Michelin Endurance Cup.
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