Forte’s Liddy, Harvey Win Race 1; Li, Dennis Close In on Pro Title

Photo: Dan Bathie/McLaren

Patrick Liddy and Tanner Harvey came out victorious in the penultimate McLaren Trophy America race of the weekend at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, while RWE Motorsports’ Casey Dennis and James Li have one hand on the Pro title after finishing first on the road.

Liddy drove his No. 21 Forte Racing McLaren Artura Trophy EVO to overall honors after the then-leading Li was assessed a 5.06-second post-race time penalty for having too short of a pit stop.

It marked Liddy and Harvey’s first overall victory in the single-make series, although it ran as a guest entry due to only debuting at the most recent round at Road America, and thus not being eligible for points.

Dennis started 12th in the 14-car field after encountering a technical issue in qualifying, and drove into the lead by Lap 7 of the 50-minute contest.

Li, however, still managed to take the Pro class win over title rivals Tommy Pintos and Cooper Broll, who received an early race drive-through penalty for incident responsibility after contact with the then overall-leading and pole-sitting No. 14 GMG Racing McLaren of James Sofronas.

The incident with Sofronas dropped him back to sixth, and was in position for Am class win in the closing stages but lost out to the No. 21 TechSport entry of Colin Harrison due to a 17.33-second post-race time penalty for too short of a pit stop for the GMG team owner/driver.

Sofronas was classified fifth overall and second in class and still comfortably leads the Am class championship with one race to go.

GMG has also provisionally clinched the team’s championship ahead of Friday’s season finale.

The No. 43 Motorsports In Action McLaren of Alexandra Hainer and Jesse Lazare finished Race 1 third overall and scored maximum points in the Pro-Am class in the process and now hold a 6.5-point lead over John Dempsey and Andrew Davis, of RWE heading into the final 50-minute contest.

Papaya Cup Am honors in the race, meanwhile, went to the No. 5 Dark Horse Racing entry of Dennis Teoman, which finished sixth overall with co-driver Jeff Cook, with Pro-Am going to Brandon Kreutz in the No. 18 Flying Lizard Motorsports entry that he shared with Canaan O’Connell.

The McLaren Trophy America season finale is set for Friday at 1:40 p.m. EST with live coverage on SRO’s GT World and the McLaren Automotive YouTube channels.

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