Robichon Wins Race 1 at VIR, Continues Sweep

Zach Robichon continued his run of success in the Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama on Saturday with victory in Race 1 at Virginia International Raceway.

He carries on his sweep of pole, race win and leading every lap that he’s had since Road America two weeks ago, with his third win since joining Moorespeed.

He stayed out front for the entirety of Saturday’s opening race in Virginia and has tied JDX Racing’s Trenton Estep for most Platinum Cup race wins this season.

Robichon held a one-second lead at the line ahead of Wright Motorsport’s Maxwell Root in second and Estep in third, who picked up his tenth podium in 11 races. 

Root’s runner-up classification sees the 2018 IMSA Hurley Haywood Scholarship Winner match his best result of the season and score his fourth podium.

Estep increased his championship lead to 342 points over Roman De Angelis’ 324, with the Kelly-Moss Road and Race driver finishing sixth after a drive-through penalty for contact with Anthony Imperato.

Michael Levitas picked up his fifth Platinum Cup Masters win of the year for TPS Racing, benefitting from a late-race incident between Charlie Luck and Alan Metni who were battling for the class lead.

Luck was penalized 21 seconds post-race, the equivalent of a drive-through, and lost three positions on the starting grid for Race 2 over responsibility for the incident.

Gold Cup honors went the way of Victor Gomez IV who scored his eighth win of the season in the class reserved for older Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars.

He duelled for the class lead with Kurt Fazekas but finally got his NGT Motorsport car out front with 25 minutes to go. 

Race 2 is scheduled for 9:15 a.m. EDT on Sunday.

RESULTS: Race 1