AUSTIN, Texas - Jordan Taylor held off a charging Dane Cameron to win Saturday’s Lone Star Le Mans at Circuit of The Americas.
It was the third IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship victory of the season for the No. 10 Konica Minolta Corvette Daytona Prototype started by Ricky Taylor, enabling the brothers to close to within seven points in the Prototype class battle with only one race remaining.
Cameron ran down Taylor and pulled alongside him with 13 minutes remaining, but Taylor held on to the lead, beating Cameron to the checkered flag by 1.421 seconds. That ended a two-race winning streak for the No. 31 Action Express Racing Whelen Engineering Corvette DP.
“During the strategy meeting coming into this race, we talked about going for the win or going for the points,” said Ricky Taylor, who started from the pole. “Today was all about the win. I think the team did a great job. The stops were all great and the strategy was perfect. I feel like we had a great car the last 3 times we were here, and it’s great to finally get a win.”
Jordan Taylor admitted feeling the heat in the latter stages of the event.
“I had an issue where the car went off the track a bit, and when I hit the accelerator the traction control didn’t catch it,” Jordan Taylor said. “I instantly turned off traction control to try and whip the car around and eventually put myself in a really bad spot. Thankfully, the guys were able to walk me through what was wrong and I was able to fix it. It was hot today, and I did two hours, 10 minutes. If it wasn’t for our new cool suit technology, I don’t think we would have made it.”
Action Express teammates Christian Fittipaldi and Joao Barbosa finished third in the No. 5 Mustang Sampling Corvette DP. Entering the season-ending Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta on Saturday, Oct. 1, Curran and Cameron unofficially have 285 points to 284 for Fittipaldi and Barbosa, with the Taylor brothers third with 278 points.
Starworks’ Van Der Zande, Popow Win Fourth Of The Year, Extend PC Lead
Renger van der Zande passed James French with seven minutes remaining, going on to score the fourth Prototype Challenge (PC) victory of the season for the No. 8 Starworks Motorsport ORECA FLM09, started by Alex Popow, extending their lead in the championship with one race remaining.
Van der Zande beat a rapidly closing Tom Kimber-Smith to the checkered flag by 0.844 seconds. Entering the finale at Road Atlanta, the Starworks drivers hold a 10-point lead (329-319) over Kimber-Smith and Robert Alon, who started the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA FLM09 from the pole.
“This was a really hard fight,” van der Zande said. “For my first stint I had Tom (Kimber-Smith) on my tail the whole time. It was a very clean race, with a lot of almost touching. Then at the end, I was able to catch James (French) on traffic, and we had a clean fight as well. It was well done for James. He’s improved so much it’s unbelievable.”
French took the lead with just over one hour remaining and led 29 laps in a bid to give Performance Tech Motorsports its first WeatherTech Championship victory. He lost the lead with three laps remaining, and was then passed by Kimber-Smith heading to the white flag. French held on to take third in the No. 38 ORECA started by Nicholas Boulle.
Matt McMurry led 16 laps in the strong run for the No. 20 BAR1 Motorsports ORECA, joining Bruno Junqueira in a fourth-place finish.
First GT Le Mans Class Victory For Porsche North America
Porsche North America teammates Earl Bamber and Frederic Makowiecki claimed their first career IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship victory and led a 1-2 GT Le Mans (GTLM) class sweep for the Porsche factory team.
Both Porsches spent much of the race battling and chasing the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 GTE co-driven by Toni Vilander and Giancarlo Fisichella before a mechanical problem removed the Ferrari from contention with under 30 minutes remaining in the two-hour, 40-minute race. With under 20 minutes remaining, Bamber drove his No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR past teammate Nick Tandy in the nearly identical No. 911 entry to take the lead.
“We didn’t have as big of a fight as we hoped, but we got a 1-2 for Porsche,” said Bamber, a 2015 overall winner at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. “It shows that we continue to fight every weekend. We have to maximize every effort, and when the people are there to make a few mistakes, we are there to be able to get a great result or a podium.”
He pulled away over the remaining distance to win by 6.399 seconds. It was Porsche’s second GTLM class victory of the season, and first since Tandy and 2015 GTLM champion Patrick Pilet won in the No. 911 Porsche at Long Beach in April.
“I’m really happy to win here,” Makowiecki said. “So many times we were close to a win, but we missed it. We showed again today we were strong. We were consistent there in the long run. We got some contact, but we were in P2 speed with the Porsches. The car was fast in the long distance. We always did a great job, and we were really strong with our teamwork. I’m really proud of today’s achievement because we always give our maximum. Today, we finally got the result from all the hard work we’re used to putting in.”
One race after taking their first victory of the season, No. 3 Corvette Racing Chevrolet Corvette C7.R co-drivers Antonio Garcia and Jan Magnussen completed the GTLM podium with a third-place run.
Curtis, Klingmann Take Second Win Of Season For BMW, Turner
Bret Curtis and Jens Klingmann earned their second GT Daytona (GTD) class victory of the season and first since the Mobil 1 SportsCar Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park in an impressive performance for Turner Motorsport in the No. 96 Spectra Resources/United Steel/Valspar Paint/IHG Rewards Club BMW M6 GT3.
Curtis started the race from eighth on the GTD grid and worked his way up to second in class before pitting under full-course caution 47 minutes into the race to hand the car off to Klingmann. The German driver rejoined the race in 10th place, but methodically worked his way forward and moved into the top five less than 20 minutes into his driving stint.
Klingmann took the lead with 50 minutes remaining when leader Madison Snow made his final pit stop in the No. 48 Castrol Edge/Universal Industrial Sales Lamborghini Huracán GT3 and pulled away over the remaining distance, beating Snow’s No. 48 co-driver, Bryan Sellers, to the stripe by 15.717 seconds.
“It’s tremendous,” Curtis said. “We had a really tough race at VIR a few weeks ago with high hopes of having a good result. I didn’t think we had the car to win today going into the race, but when we got in the car it was really strong and I was just hanging in there in the fast corners. I knew if I brought the car home clean and gave the car over to my co-driver, he’d have a shot of bringing it home, and he really did. He made some moves and did a great job.”
Sellers and Snow took second one race after claiming their first victory of the season in the Michelin GT Challenge at VIRginia International Raceway. Third place in GTD went to No. 63 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488 GT3 co-drivers Christina Nielsen and Alessandro Balzan, who expanded their lead in the championship standings to 32 points, 299-267, over No. 33 ViperExchange.com/Cruising with the Monkey Dodge Viper GT3-R co-drivers Ben Keating and Jeroen Bleekemolen heading into the WeatherTech Championship season-ending Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta in two weeks.
