Porsche Penske Duo Dominate at Road America
Photo courtesy of IMSA
It would be a gross oversimplification to say Sunday’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race at Elkhart Lake’s Road America was decided in morning warm-up when Alexander Sims crashed early in the 20-minute session.
While the Whelen Engineering Racing crew was able to repair the pole-winning Cadillac V-Series.R in time for the race, it had to start at the rear of the GTP class in tenth. After setting the pace in both practice sessions on Friday and winning the pole on Saturday, Sims and co-driver Pipo Derani never were able to get to the front in the largely caution-free race.
Their misfortune paved the way for Matt Campbell in the number seven Porsche Penske Motorsport Porsche 963 to make a clean getaway at the start and build a lead that would prove to be insurmountable. Campbell took the win along with co-driver Felipe Nasr in the 2-hour forty-minute timed race in front of the largest IMSA crowd at Road America since 1979 at the 4.048-mile track.
“Yeah, obviously we got a little lucky there at the start of the race with the 31 having an incident in the warm-up and taking the pole position” said Campbell. “I think for us it was really important to be qualifying at the front and then get lucky starting on the right side. This track, with the surface now, it’s really hard to pass and once you get close in high speed, the aero wash is quite extreme.
“Just having that track position out front and I feel like opposite the 60 car and us towards the end of the race I had such incredible luck with traffic at the beginning. I feel like our pace was really good as well and I was quite comfortable out in front and slowly chipping away. I think we got really lucky with traffic and why the gap looked so big at times because even I was surprised at how easy it was to get through. It made your race a lot easier at the start.”
“To finally get a win, it feels like a long time coming, almost. I feel like we’ve had really good speed at times during this year, but mistakes or issues with the car or strategy or anything like that, to finally all come together in such a perfect race today, after a difficult start to the weekend, especially, was phenomenal. Really happy for everyone at Porsche Penske Motorsports and nice to finally get one on the board.”
Photo courtesy of IMSA
The gap Campbell and Nasr had built up began to shrink in the latter stages of the race. With eight minutes remaining, Tom Blomqvist cut the margin to just 1.726-seconds in his Meyer Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Acura ARX-06 as Nasr encountered heavy lapped traffic.
“I got lucky with some of the traffic earlier in that last stint.” said Blomqvist. “At one point, he got held up quite a bit towards the end of the start-finish straight and I basically got in this train of seven cars along the straight so that kind of put me in a closer range. Traffic always ebbs and flows and I guess he got a bit more fortunate than I did in the last five laps or so of the race. Getting close is one thing and passing is another matter.”
Once he cleared the traffic, Nasr’s margin of victory was 4.635-seconds at the checkered flag in front of the largest IMSA crowd at Road America since its debut race at the 4.048-mile track in 1979.
“Right at the end, traffic can go both ways. At this track in a particular area if you just don’t clear traffic well, you’re going to carry that all the way to, let’s say, the final sector, and you can not just make (your way) through it. It’s just the way it is. It’s IMSA racing and I love everything about it and I’m just happy that we finally made it. Nice work to Matt, as well, and everybody on the number seven crew.”
Photo courtesy of IMSA
It was the first win for Campbell and Nasr this season.
During practice on Friday, the Penske duo looked nothing like winners. But after going through the data, the team made a number of changes to the car for Saturday qualifying that obviously paid off.
“We tested here a couple of months ago,” said Campbell, “but since then, the track evolution has been absolutely huge. We came here in practice and were struggling in all areas, not only on car balance but also on software and so forth. We made some big swings overnight. We really dug through and found some issues and, obviously, going into qualifying it was a big unknown what we were going to have, really, as a package. But, luckily, it’s gone our way and we were just able to fine tune the car going into the race.
“Hat’s off to the team. They were able to turn it around for us. We were digging through a lot Friday night trying to figure it out and luckily, it’s paid off.”
“Hat’s off to the team. They were able to turn it around for us. We were digging through a lot Friday night trying to figure it out and luckily, it’s paid off.”
Nasr added it was a big relief to finally get a win, thus becoming the sixth different winning car in seven races so far this season.
“I was just really happy that everything finally came together this weekend. We’ve been close several times. Speed was there, a couple reliability issues along the year.
“The whole weekend, I felt like we did a great job all around to set up for the race. Matt did a great qualifying, maximizing the package and getting up front in the race, just looking after his tires, looking after his pace. Just good job all weekend, to be honest. It’s a big relief for the whole team because I know how much hard work has been put on that 7 crew, so I’m very proud of everybody, a huge thanks to them.”
Road America’s new surface proved tricky all weekend, While the racing groove provided plenty of grip, venturing offline was risky according to Campbell.
“At least from my side, the surface has made it quite a lot challenging because I feel like in some areas you can probably attack more and take more risks going around the outside, but you really can’t take the risk and go offline because risk is quite big. Yeah, it’s making it really challenging, especially in a place like the Carousel. Unless you get past the GT car in the first part of it, you’re stuck behind him. You just gotta be patient and take the loss and wait for the exit. It’s probably too risky to go around the outside”
That view was echoed by Gar Robinson, who took the LMP3 win with co-driver Josh Burdon in their Riley Ligier JS P320.
“I think the whole field’s biggest competitor this weekend was the track, the racing just being so different than it has in the past. I think it’s something everyone’s going to have to get used to. That was probably the biggest challenge of anybody on the grid.”
Photo courtesy of IMSA
Bryan Sellers and co-driver Madison Snow, scored their fourth win of the season in GT Daytona in their Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3. Sellers, too, agreed the track itself was the day’s biggest challenge, especially after the numerous incidents in practice.
“I think that what you saw in the evolution from practice and qualifying to the race was that everybody gained quite a bit of respect for the track and what needed to be done. I think that, for us, after qualifying, we felt that we would probably be our own biggest enemy should we ask too much, or try too hard. I would say in my career, it’s probably one of the races you’ve had to manage the most in terms of just pace and comfort and being on line in traffic. It’s really incredible how much time you could lose in traffic. You could see these ebbs and flows of two-seconds in losses which is just astronomical.”
In GT Daytona Pro, Alex Riberas and co-driver Ross Gunn took their second consecutive win of the season in the Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT3 while Ben Keating and Paul-Loup Chatin took claimed top honors in LMP2 in their PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA 07.
In Sunday’s 120-minute Michelin Pilot Challenge, Bryce Ward and Daniel Morad drove their Winward Racing Mercedes AMG GT GT4 took the checkered flag in Grand Sport but were DQ’d for a fuel capacity infraction in post race inspection. That handed the win to the Rebel Rock Racing Chevrolet Camaro GTR.4 team of Robin Liddel and co-driver Frank DePew.
Roy Block and Tim Lewis won in Touring Car in KMW with TMR Engineering’s Alfa Romeo Giuletta Veloce TCR.