Gidley Dominates Race 1 at Sonoma

Memo Gidley claimed a commanding victory in the first GT America powered by AWS race of the weekend at Sonoma Raceway.

The SKI Autosports driver drove his Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II to a 3.932-second win over the No. 013 R. Ferri Motorsport Ferrari 296 GT3 Evo of Marc Muzzo.

Scott Blind completed the overall and SRO3 class podium in third aboard his Ruckus Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo.

It came in a caution-free 40-minute contest that didn’t lack any incidents, the most notable coming on the second lap after the No. 19 RS1 Porsche of Joel Cortes came together with Mirco Schultis’ Callaway Corvette C7 GT3-R in Turn 2.

Both cars limped back to the pits with damage and ultimately retired, while Cortes was handed a drive-through penalty for incident responsibility.

Ross Chouest got around Dave Musial Sr. in the final 15 minutes to finish fourth in the Chouest Povoledo Racing Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R, while Kyle Washington took over fifth after Musial Sr. pitted due to picking up grass in his Wright Motorsports Porsche’s front grille after an off-course excursion.

Chouest and Washington, along with Schultis’ Callaway Corvette, were forced to start from the rear of the SRO3 field after being deemed to have violated the checkered flag procedure in qualifying.

The No. 04 HP-TECH Motorsport Ferrari of Tony Davis, who was also sent to the back after qualifying, but for a boost-related infraction, finished sixth, while Musial Sr. rebounded to seventh, passing the No. 23 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari of Thor Haugen in the closing stages.

Top class honors in the Cup category went to the RacingSupport Ginetta GTP8 of David Lecko, after issues for the Gotham Motorsports Ferrari 488 Challenge EVO of Yousuf Nabi, the only other entry in the new-for-2026 class this weekend.

Flying Lizard Motorsports’ Craig Lumsden, meanwhile, picked up GT4 honors in his lone-running BMW M4 GT4 EVO entry.

Race 2 is on tap for Sunday at 11 a.m. PST (2 p.m. EST) with live coverage on SRO’s GT World YouTube channel and on Twitch.

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