The Heart of Racing Sweeps Lime Rock Park

Photo: Jake Galstad/IMSA

The Heart of Racing claimed a sweep in Saturday’s FCP Euro Northeast Grand Prix, taking wins in both the GTD Pro and GTD classes with its Aston Martin Vantage GT3 machinery.

Alex Riberas drove the No. 23 Aston Martin to a 0.336-second win over the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 of Ben Barnicoat for the overall win in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GT-only contest at Lime Rock Park.

The team’s No. 27 Aston of Roman De Angelis and Marco Sorensen, meanwhile, scooped up GTD honors.

While briefly losing the lead through the first round of pit stops, pole-sitter Ross Gunn regained the top spot in the No. 23 car when the Ian James-led crew elected to keep the Aston out on track while under the race’s first full course caution.

It enabled Gunn to retake the lead and the car maintained the lead through the second round of green flag stops in the final 1 hour and 13 minutes of the race.

A second caution, for Brendan Iribe’s crashed No. 70 Inception Racing McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, set up a 48-minute run to the checkered flag, which Riberas controlled.

It not only marked the first win of the season for Gunn and Riberas but also their first podium finish in GTD Pro this year.

Barnicoat and Jack Hawksworth extended their class championship lead with a runner-up finish, with the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R of Klaus Bachler and Patrick Pilet completing the overall and class podium in third.

Bachler benefitted from a gear selection issue during Jordan Taylor’s final pit stop, which dropped the No. 3 Chevrolet Corvette C8.R GTD to an eventual fourth-place result.

Sorensen and De Angelis, meanwhile, were classified fifth overall for their second class win of the season.

The Aston Martin factory driver held off Porsches from both Julien Andlauer and Trent Hindman for top class honors, with all three cars having benefitted from misfortune for the No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 of Madison Snow while in the lead in the second hour.

Snow was assessed a drive-through penalty due to contact with the No. 32 Team Korthoff Motorsport Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo of Mike Skeen while during the first round of stops, dropping it outside of the top ten.

Snow and co-driver Bryan Seller salvaged a eighth place class finish although lost a chunk of its points lead.

Andlauer in the No. 92 Kellymoss with Riley Porsche that he shared with Alec Udell pressured Sorensen in the closing laps but came under attack by Hindman, who along with co-driver Alan Brynjolffson, claimed their first podium finish of the season in the No. 77 Wright Motorsports Porsche.

The No. 96 Turner Motorsport BMW of Robby Foley and Patrick Gallagher were fourth, followed by Loris Spinelli and Misha Goikhberg, who rebounded from an early race derive-through penalty for a top-five in their No. 78 Forte Racing by US RaceTronics Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2.

RESULTS: FCP Euro Northeast Grand Prix

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