Perfect!
Watching the Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen this word came to my mind time and time again. Sure not everything IMSA did was perfect the racing it self was not flawless to say the least. But that is part of what made this race perfect for racing fans in general. Not to mention the fact that after the 6 hours the points races in all for classes are just beginning to heat up.
Yes we can have the performance equality conversation between the DP and the LM P2 cars till we are blue in the face. But for the first this season I saw a race that was not on a street circuit in which both a Daytona Prototype and LMP2 car had a shot at winning.
That is not the only reason this race was perfect for racing fans. Three out of the four classes came down to that one flying last lap, after 5 hours and 30 seconds of what was a sprint endurance race. I heard from driver after driver in interviews that every lap was a qualification lap.
But lets take a look at it class by class:
Prototype:
In the prototype class one big upset of the day was the Chip Ganassi Tel Mex number 01. After an early race dust up with a GT car Memo Rojas and Scott Pruett were never in the race for the rest of the day. But they still played a pivotal role in the end of the race, this time when Pruett ended up in the tire barrier after getting hit by a PC car. The Action Express duo of Joa0 Barbosa and Christian Fittipaldi continued their rock solid year with a third place podium spot after passing Rickey Taylor on the last lap of the race. The Wayne Taylor Racing trio of Rickey and Jordan Taylor with Max Angelelli came back from early race penalties to place fourth. The race was mainly between the Spirit of Daytona Racing number 90 DP and the Oak Racing number 42 Morgan-Nissan LM P2. The straight line speed of the DP passed and held off the LM P2 car on the second to last restart. It was good to see the Spirit of Daytona group take their first TUSC win.
GT LM:
The diverse field of factory and efforts gave us great racing all day leading us to that last lap. When the SRT Vipers (now with the classic red with white pinstripes) was on the tale of Corvette Racings #3 driven by Antonio Garcia who held off the challenge all the way through the final turn of the last lap to clinch victory for him and Jon Magnussen.
Prototype Challenge:
Core Autosport was the class of the field and has now won the first 3 of the 4 Patron North American Endurance Championship.
GT Daytona:
Fan favorites Tuner Motorsports with Dane Cameron takes home the victory, just holding off the challenge of the #555 Ferrari being driven by Townsend Bell. Andy Lally finish third in the #44 Porsche.
So what is not to like with this parody. In one race we saw a Corvette DP, Morgan-Nissan, Oreca FLM, Corvette CR-7, SRT Viper, BMW Z4, Ferrari F458 and last but not least Porsche 911 all on the podium.
This certainly sets up a great second half to the TUSC season.
Next race:
July 11-13
Mobil 1 Sportscar Grand Prix presented by Hawk
Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.
TV: FOX Sports 1 2:00 PM EDT