Lewis Subs, Stars En Route to Saturday Win at Mid-Ohio

IMSA veteran Corey Lewis played a fill-in role to perfection in Saturday’s first of two 45-minute IMSA VP Racing SportsCar Challenge races at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course.

Lewis, substituting for the injured Matthew Dicken in the No. 36 RAFA Racing Ligier JS P320 Nissan won his first race in the LMP3 class. Dicken stood down with a shoulder injury and Lewis, Dicken’s longtime co-driver, filled in to capture the win.

He finished second on the road to Oscar Tunjo in the No. 31 Gebhardt Intralogistics Motorsports Duqueine D08 Nissan, but took the top spot at the checkered flag as Tunjo was assessed a ten-second post-race time penalty for a false start at the initial green flag, changing columns.

The race in P3 appeared to belong to the pole-sitting Valentino Catalano in the No. 30 Gebhardt Duqueine who led the opening 19 laps, but intermittent mechanical woes after the second race restart slowed his progress.

Catalano checked up heading into Turn 2, the Keyhole, on Lap 20 where both Tunjo and Lewis made it past. Catalano eventually fell down the order to eighth overall, fourth in P3 at the checkered flag behind Bronze Cup winner Brian Thienes in the No. 77 Forte Racing Ligier.

The GTDX race was a straightforward affair as Turner Motorsport captured a pair of wins with its two BMW M4 GT3s.

Jake Walker led flag-to-flag from pole for his third straight win in the No. 6 Turner BMW, with a key pass on Thienes earlier in the race helping to gap several of his GTDX competitors.

Walker won by 3.661 seconds over points leader AJ Muss, who scored his fifth straight class podium in the No. 66 AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3. Adam Adelson in the No. 24 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R was third, ahead of Bronze Cup winner Vin Barletta in the No. 95 Turner Motorsport BMW M4 GT3.

In GSX, Steven Clemons finally broke through for his first win of the season in the No. 76 BSI Racing Toyota GR Supra GT4 EVO2 over Kiko Porto.

Porto qualified fastest but was sent to the rear for an infraction found in post-qualifying technical inspection. Undeterred, the driver of the No. 8 RAFA Racing Toyota embarked on a mission through the 11-car class field.

Clemons inherited the pole and started ahead of Porto’s teammate Ian Porter in the No. 68 RAFA Racing Toyota. Chris Walsh started third in the No. 22 TWOth Autosport Porsche 718 GT4 RS CS.

Porto climbed seven spots to fourth by the first full-course caution of the race on Lap 5 following debris on course from an incident between two other GSX class cars.

That positioned him right behind the leading trio for the restart, and two quick moves in the next green flag stanza got him to second behind Clemons ahead of the second restart with just under 20 minutes remaining.

But Porto was unable to save enough of his tires and mount a pass on Clemons, ending 1.124 seconds behind at the checkered flag. Porter was third, banking another podium and scoring the GSX Bronze Cup win.

Sunday’s second race of the weekend, Race 6 of the VP Racing SportsCar Challenge season, goes green at 9 a.m. ET. Coverage begins at 8:55 a.m. ET on Peacock in the U.S. and globally via IMSA’s Official YouTube channel and IMSA.TV.

RESULTS: Race 1