THE LINE - MAY 7, 2014

(John Thawley  ~  Motorsports Photography @ www.johnthawley.com  ~ 248.227.0110)

The team of Ed Brown and Johannes van Overbeek (No. 2 Tequila Patrón HPD ARX-03b/Honda) won the Continental Tire Grand Prix of Monterey powered by Mazda at Laguna Seca (Mazda Raceway) on Sunday – the first victory for a P2 Prototype in the inaugural TUDOR United SportsCar Championship. The duo averaged 97.318 mph in the two-hour race on the 11-turn, 2.238-mile road course. The win came after an “adjustment of performance” made by IMSA that lessened horsepower capabilities for the Daytona Prototypes, which had won the season’s first three races. Brown and van Overbeek won overall in the  TUDOR Championship’s Prototype (P) and GT Le Mans (GTLM) classes, the second of two races Sunday. Van Overbeek took the lead for good with 15 minutes remaining when he passed No. 10 Konica Minolta Corvette DP driver Jordan Taylor in Turn 3. Taylor and his brother Ricky finished second; finishing third were Memo Rojas and Scott Pruett, in the No. 01 Telcel Ford EcoBoost/Riley. That pass "was sort of inevitable,” said Jordan Taylor, conceding that on this day and track, the No. 2 had too much car. “I mean, we came into this race knowing the P2s would be strong. We led a lot, but that was mostly due to strategy.” Check out John Thawley's scintillating images from the USCC race weekend at Laguna Seca here.

(John Thawley  ~  Motorsports Photography @ www.johnthawley.com  ~ 248.227.0110)
Antonio Garcia and Jan Magnussen (No. 3 Chevrolet Corvette C7.R) won their second consecutive TUDOR United SportsCar Championship race Sunday, winning the Continental Tire Monterey Grand Prix powered by Mazda at Laguna Seca ( Mazda Raceway). Garcia passed Giancarlo Fisichella (No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari F458 Italia) for the GT Le Mans (GTLM) class lead with 21 minutes remaining and drove to a 4.710-second victory ahead of Bill Auberlen (No. 55 BMW Team RLL BMW Z4 GTE). “Traffic in this series is very [difficult] and as soon as I saw a Prototype going to pass [Fisichella], I really went for it and made a run as much as possible,” said Garcia. “He had no chance to block me and after that [I could use] all the tires I had saved.” The race highlight was an intense battle between the No. 55 BMW Team RLL BMW Z4 GTE of Bill Auberlen and the No. 911 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR of Nick Tandy for second. After both cars found their way past Fisichella, the battle led to contact between Tandy and Auberlen on the second-to-last lap, forcing Auberlen off course. Despite the incident on the prior lap, Auberlen caught back up to Tandy and got past in the final turn to take second place. After a review by IMSA officials, the No. 911 team received a post-race “stop, plus 60-second” penalty for the contact, moving the car to ninth and the No. 62 Ferrari of Fisichella and Pierre Kaffer to third. “We assessed a penalty similar to what we assessed throughout the entire race for an on-track incident which is a stop, plus 60-second penalty to the (No.) 911,” said Scot Elkins, IMSA vice president of competition and technical regulations. The next TUDOR Championship round for the GTLM class will be the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen on June 29. The race – which also is the third round of the Tequila Patrón North American Endurance Cup – will be televised live on FOX Sports 1 at 11 a.m. ET.

(John Thawley  ~  Motorsports Photography @ www.johnthawley.com  ~ 248.227.0110)
Renger van der Zande (No. 8 Starworks ORECA FLM09, with co-driver Mirco Schultis) dominated Sunday’s opening race in the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship doubleheader at the Continental Tire Monterey Grand Prix presented by Mazda. In the race combining the PC and GT Daytona (GTD) classes at Laguna Seca (Mazda Raceway), van der Zande finished 12.234 seconds in front of the second-place No. 25 8Star Motorsports ORECA FLM09 of Sean Rayhall/Diaz. Schultis started the No. 8 and ran 41 minutes, remarkably surviving an early-race incident in Turn 8 with the No. 54 CORE autosport entry of Jon Bennett, who co-leads the championship standings with co-driver Colin Braun. “I thought that was the end,” Schultis said, “Somehow I got out of the dirt and on the track and somehow it was still running.” Van der Zande would grab the lead with 23 minutes remaining, when the pole-sitting No. 09 entry driven by Bruno Junqueira of RSR Racing pitted for tires and fuel. Junqueira and co-driver Duncan Ende finished third.

(John Thawley  ~  Motorsports Photography @ www.johnthawley.com  ~ 248.227.0110)
Spencer Pumpelly (No. 45 Flying Lizard Audi R8 LMS) ran out of fuel coming out of the famed Laguna Seca Corkscrew on the final lap of Sunday’s two-hour race in the Continental Tire Monterey Grand Prix powered by Mazda handing the GT Daytona (GTD) class victory to Dane Cameron (No. 94 Turner Motorsport BMW Z4, started by Markus Palttala). A would-be race for second wound up being the battle for the win as Cameron held off a hard-charging Christopher Haase (No. 48 Paul Miller Racing Audi R8 LMS started by Bryce Miller) in the final corner to pick up the win by 0.168 seconds. Meanwhile, Pumpelly stopped approximately 100 yards short of the start-finish line for a heartbreaking sixth-place finish. Haase found himself battling Cameron for the win after Alex Job Racing’s pair of Porsche 911 GT Americas pitted for fuel from the second and third positions with less than seven minutes remaining. Andy Lally and John Potter finished third in the No. 44 Magnus Racing Porsche 911 GT America. An early-race spin forced Turner Motorsport to alter its pit strategy and top off its fuel with one hour remaining, giving them more than enough fuel to make it the distance. The same could not be said for Pumpelly who took the lead on the first round of pit stops and quickly went into fuel conversation mode, saving fuel for much of his one-hour, 17-minute stint. “Everything said we should have been good, and now that we missed it by that little bit, I’m kicking myself for every [one minute] 31 [second] lap time that could have been a [one minute] 32 [second] lap,” said Pumpelly. “This is a new car for us, this our third race with it and there’s things we just don’t know yet. This is the first time we’ve been in this situation.”

(Photo by Nigel Kinrade, LAT Photo USA © 2014, courtesy of Toyota Racing)
Denny Hamlin (No. 11 Joe Gibbs Racing FedEx Express Toyota Camry) leads Greg Biffle (No. 16 Roush Fenway Racing 3M Window Film Ford Fusion) and Clint Bowyer (No. 15 Michael Waltrip Racing PEAK Antifreeze/Motor Oil Toyota Camry) during the Aaron's 499 NASCAR Sprint Cup race at Talladega Superspeedway on Sunday. That's how they finished, although the usual crash-fest masquerading as a race ended under caution. Watch the NASCAR video here.

(IMSA)
Trent Hindman and John Edwards (No. 46 Fall-Line Motorsports BMW M3) won the Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge race on Saturday at Laguna Seca (Mazda Raceway). Edwards took the lead after an exchange of pit stops with one hour remaining, and then prevailed on three restarts to hold off Lawson Aschenbach (No. 01 CKS Autosport Chevrolet Camaro Z/28.R) by 0.473 seconds at the checkered flag. It was Edwards’ sixth Continental Tire Challenge triumph, while the 18-year-old Hindman won for the first time in his eighth start.  Max Riddle and Kris Wilson (No. 07 TRG-AMR Aston Martin Vantage) finished third.

(Mazda)
 Andrew Carbonell and Randy Pobst (No. 26 Freedom Autosport Mazda MX-5) won its fourth consecutive Street Tuner (ST) race at Laguna Seca (Mazda Raceway), leading a 1-2-3 Mazda sweep. It was Carbonell’s third victory at the circuit and fifth of his career, while Pobst won in his first Continental Tire Challenge race at the circuit. It was Pobst’s eighth career victory in the series. The ST race came down to a three-way battle of Mazda MX-5s between Carbonell and CJ Wilson Racing teammates Stevan McAleer (No. 5 CJ Wilson Racing Mazda MX-5 with Chad McCumbee) and Tyler McQuarrie (No. 3 CJ Wilson Racing Mazda MX-5 with Elliott Skeer). While he was passed several times, Carbonell managed to regain the lead each time, taking the checkered flag by 1.253 seconds over McQuarrie – who passed his teammate for second on the final lap.

(Photo by Chris Owens/INDYCAR)
2013 Indy Lights champion Sage Karam sits in his No. 22 Dreyer & Reinbold Kingdom Racing Chevrolet entry before going out for Indianapolis 500 Rookie Orientations Program practice at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Monday, May 5th. The program is designed to provide the first-year competitors an opportunity to get acquainted with their cars and the racetrack through three speed phases set by INDYCAR: 10 laps at 200-205 mph, 15 laps at 205-210 mph and 15 laps at 210-plus mph. Driver stewards monitor car control, placement and also look for a consistent driving pattern. Karam's machine developed a mechanical issue that prevented the 19-year-old from Nazareth, Pa., from completing all three phases of the program. Per Indianapolis 500 rules, Karam will be allowed to finish the third phase on the first day of practice May 11. Drivers who completed the program included Kurt Busch (No. 26 Andretti Autosport Suretone Honda) with a top speed of  222.289 mph; Mikhail Aleshin (No. 7 Schmidt Peterson Motorsports Honda), 219.170 mph; Jack Hawksworth (No. 98 Bryan Herta Autosport Honda), 217.936 mph; Carlos Huertas (No. 18 Dale Coyne Racing Honda), 217.916 mph; and Martin Plowman (No. 41 A.J. Foyt Racing ABC Supply Honda), 217.085 mph. Jacques Villeneuve (No. 5 Schmidt Peterson Motorsports Dollar General Honda) completed his refresher laps with a top speed of 217.742 mph.