IMSA - Road America: Full podium of Corvette drivers
Dane Cameron and Eric Curran (Action Express Racing) are the overall winners of the Continental Tire Road Race Showcase at Road America, the ninth round of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. The duo in the #31 Corvette DP win ahead of teammates Christian Fittipaldi and Joao Barbosa in the #5 Corvette DP. Two more Corvette DP drivers completed the podiums, as Ricky and Jordan Taylor finished third in the #10 Wayne Taylor Racing’s car.
In other classes, the winners are Robert Alon/Tom Kimber-Smith (PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports), Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner (Corvette Racing) and Jeroen Bleekemolen/Ben Keating (Riley Motorsports).
Daytona Prototype class podium
Championship battle tightens to one point
The double victory at Road America is third consecutive 1-2 finish for Action Express Racing and second in a row victory for the duo Cameron/Curran. With only two races remaining, the championship battle is tightened to just one point advantage of Fittipaldi/Barbosa over Cameron/Curran.
Brothers Ricky and Jordan Taylor finished third in the Elkhart Lake and they were also third in the championship points. They were followed by John Pew and Ozz Negri in the #60 Ligier JS P2 of the Michael Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian The pole winners Jonathan Bomarito and Tristan Nunez finished fifth in the #55 Mazda Prototype.
Prototype Challenge class podium at Road America
Prototype Challenge class leader crashed
In the Prototype Challenge class, Tom Kimber-Smith and Robert Alon scored the second victory of the season in the #52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA FLM 09. The key moment of the race happened with 13 minutes remaining when class leader in the championship Renger van der Zande crashed in Turn 9 while battling for second.
It means that the #8 Starworks Motorsport crew Van der Zande/Alex Popow didn’t score points, so their championship lead is decreased from 17 to 7 points. Colin Braun and Jon Bennett finished second in the #54 CORE Autosport car, 2.557 seconds behind leaders. Pole-sitters Kyle Marcelli and James French finished third in the #38 Performance Tech Motorsports car.
GTLM class podium at Road America
Fourth win for #4 Corvette
Among GT cars, Corvette gets one more victory in the GTLM class, with Oliver Gavin and Tommy Milner scoring their fourth win of the season in the #4 Corvette C7.R. Milner fought for the win against Richard Westbrook in the #67 Chip Ganassi Racing’s Ford GT and he made a decisive move in the last lap. John Edwards and Lucas Luhr completed the podium in the #100 Team RLL’s BMW M6. With three races remaining, Milner and Gavin are the championship leaders in the GTLM class with 264 points, thirteen more than Westbrook and Ryan Briscoe.
Second win for Riley’s #33 Dodge
In the GTD class, Jeroen Bleekemolen takes the victory for #33 Riley Motorsports’ Dodge Viper GT3-R, which he drove together with Ben Keating. Dodge crossed the finish line 1.76 seconds ahead of #73 Park Place Porsche 911 GT3 R of Jorg Bergmeister and Patrick Lindsey. It was the second win of the season for Bleekemolen/Keating. They moved closer to the class leaders Christina Nielsen and Alessandro Balzan, who finished third at Road America in the #63 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488 GTE.
