World of Sport: IMSA; NASCAR Cup; Super Formula; ELMS; Euroformula Open; Motogp
IMSA SPORTSCAR MID-OHIO (USA) 16 MAY
ROUND 3/13
Wayne Taylor Racing strengthened its lead to 55 points in the IMSA Sportscar standings as Filipe Albuquerque and
Ricky Taylor guided their Acura ARX-05 to a narrow victory over the Action
Express Cadillac DPI-V.R of all-brazilian pairing Pipo Derani and Felipe Nasr last Sunday at Mid-ohio.
Acura/american Honda, which has a dozen different manufacturing and
R&D facilities in Ohio, has now won all four races since IMSA’S return to the parkland venue in 2018.
British duo Harry Tincknell and Oliver Jarvis had to settle for third place in their Mazda RT24-P, although they’d landed pole and dominated much of the 122-lap race. After struggling for pace during practice on Friday, the Multimatic-mazda team made wholesale set-up changes – “We threw the kitchen sink at it,” said Multimatic boss Larry Holt – which transformed the handling and enabled Tincknell to establish a blistering new track record in qualifying.
Albuquerque, on his first visit to the 2.3-mile track, started second, less than a tenth adrift of the pole time, but was soon left gasping in Tincknell’s wake on race day. The gap grew to over 12 seconds before the first round of pitstops with 40 minutes on the clock, after which Derani and Nasr emerged in second, having been the first of the Prototype contenders to make their first visit. Tincknell extended his lead further before making his second stop at the halfway point and handing over the car to Jarvis.
Unfortunately, the pair’s fine work was undone when the caution flags flew for the first and only time with about an hour to go. The timing ensured that everyone would be working hard to minimise their fuel consumption when the green flags waved again with 45 minutes remaining. Crucially, the Albuquerque/taylor Acura had stretched its fuel load the furthest, so required a quicker fill than the Mazda and was able to leapfrog into second place behind Nasr, who took full advantage of having been called into the pits moments before the full-course caution.
It was Nasr who led at the restart, on a track which offers precious few overtaking opportunities, but Taylor dug deep and pulled off a brilliant pass after the restart. Taylor then managed to conserve his fuel and squeak home just 0.368s ahead of Nasr. The Mazda also managed to stretch its fuel load to the finish to maintain its streak of three podium finishes to begin the season.
Loic Duval/tristan Vautier finished fourth in their JDC Motorsports Cadillac, profiting when two other cars – including the Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac of Kevin Magnussen/renger van der Zande – needed a splash of fuel in the dying moments.
In the GTD competition, Jack Hawksworth looked set to score a second successive Mid-ohio triumph for himself and pole-winning team-mate Aaron Telitz, only for their Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 to suffer a suspension failure after 50 laps. Their misfortune allowed Bill Auberlen and Robby Foley to take the spoils aboard their Turner Motorsport BMW M6 GT3.