Stiak Takes First Win in Maxson Drama; ACI Historic Sweep

Photo: Jessica Johnk/Porsche

Janne Stiak claimed his first career Porsche Carrera Cup North America victory after pole-sitter Tyler Maxson hit drama in an in incident-filled opening race of the weekend at Watkins Glen International.

The 19-year-old German drove his No. 40 ACI Motorsports Porsche 911 Cup to a narrow 0.458-second win over the No. 9 JDX Racing entry of Callum Hedge, following a late-race battle between the two drivers.

Aaron Jeansonne completed the podium in third, ahead of Jared Thomas and Cole Kleck, in fourth and fifth, respectively.

Pro class points leader Maxson led the opening six laps, and through a lengthy full course caution, until being forced to the pits with 22 minutes to go for a punctured right-front tire.

The Topp Racing driver fell further down the running order having made a second stop although managed to provisionally hold on to the championship lead, 23 points ahead of Jeansonne.

ACI claimed class wins in all three classes — a first since the launch of the single-make championship in 2021 — with the No. 54 entry of Patrick Mulcachy picking up Pro-Am honors and Matt Smith in Masters.

Mulcahy cruised to a 21-second win over the No. 29 Kellymoss Porsche of Josh Conley, while Smith, who finished second on the road, took the Masters win after teammate Richard Edge was assessed a ten-second post-race time penalty for incident responsibility with the No. 26 Scalzo Autosport entry of Alain Scalzo that dropped him to fourth in class.

Scalzo, meanwhile, finished second in class, with Kellymoss’ John Goetz in third.

The 40-minute race was marred by a five-car incident at the start when Masters class pole-sitter Scott Blind spun his Ruckus Racing Porsche over the outside curb of Turn 1, which collected Alan Metni, Rob Walker and Chris Bellomo.

Marco Cirone spun his No. 88 ACI Motorsports entry behind the chaos and managed to continue.

The race restarted with 24 minutes left on the clock and ran caution-free to the finish.

RESULTS: Race 1

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