We had gone over nine hours in the Sebring 12 Hours before seeing them come together, but when they did, it was a race and season-defining moment. After incidents at Petit Le Mans and Laguna Seca, another chapter in the saga between the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac DPi-V.R. and the Acura Team Penske stable has been written.
Pipo Derani in the #31 Cadillac and Juan Pablo-Montoya in the #6 Acura Team Penske collided twice while battling for the lead, the second contact, perhaps more concerning, as Derani dove to the inside of Montoya at Turn 5, shooting for a gap that did not exist. The contact sent Montoya spinning and sent Derani to the pits to serve a drive-thru penalty and fix a broken right front suspension.
The penalty and ensuing damage cost the #31 Cadillac any chance at a championship they still had, and it left Mazda to inherit a 1-2 lead at the fore of the field. With the #55 Mazda RT-24P currently leading the way and the #77 Mazda RT-24P also running well, Mazda looks to be in a great position for the final hour.
The #6 Acura recovered from its contact with the #31 Cadillac and is back up to third in the class but is still 32.695 seconds behind the #77 Mazda.
The #25 BMW M8 GTE currently leads the race in GTLM. Conor De Phillippi is in the car and has a 22.029-second lead on the pair of Porsche 911 RSRs. The #911 Porsche 911 RSR of Nick Tandy is leading the way for Porsche in second.
The #3 Corvette suffered the same fate of its sister car as the left rear suspension of the car failed, sending it behind the wall and out of contention for the race win. Antonio Garcia and Jordan Taylor had already secured the Driver’s and Team’s Championship, though. The #3 Corvette is running but is nine laps down.
In GTD, the #63 Scuderia Corsa Weathertech Racing Ferrari 488 GT3 is still in the lead. Alessandro Balzan has taken over from Jeff Westphal. They are still being chased by Jan Heylen in the #16 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3.
The #96 Turner Motorsports BMW M6 officially retired from the race following a brake issue. Despite the chaotic nature of this race, they were just the second team to retire.
There have been no changes to the race in LMP2 where the #52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA 07 leads the race with a three-lap gap on the rest of the field.
The #8 Tower Motorsports by Starworks ORECA 07 is in second. The #38 Performance Tech Motorsports ORECA 07 is in third.
Hour 9 Report
With three hours remaining, darkness has fallen at the Sebring 12 Hours with the #6 Acura Team Penske ARX-05c controlling the lead of the race, having gained that spot during the most recent round of pitstops.
The #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac DPi-V.R., who needs to win this race to have a shot at the DPi Championship, is currently in second. Pipo Derani is behind the wheel of the car trying to keep their title hopes alive.
Perhaps one of the most surprising stories of DPi has been the #5 Mustang Sampling Cadillac DPi-V.R. The all-French lineup of Sebastian Bourdais, Loic Duval, and Tristan Vautier have run what has likely been the best race of the season for the #5 Cadillac crew. Bourdais led the race for much of the last three hours but the team lost spots in the pits.
Vautier is in the #5 Cadillac now and has been able to keep the #6 Acura and #31 Cadillac within his sights.
Out front in GTLM is the #3 Corvette C8.R of Jordan Taylor. That lead is small, though, less than a second ahead of the two BMW Team RLL entries who have experienced a breakthrough in pace since the sunset.
Prior to the latest Full Course Yellow, caused by the #4 Corvette C8.R, the two BMW M8s led GTLM 1-2 and were showing good pace compared to the rest of the field.
The #4 Corvette C8.R suffered what appeared to be a suspension failure that sent the car spinning at Sunset Bend while Oliver Gavin was in the car. The car was brought back into the garage on a flatbed truck where repairs began. The car has been in the garage for roughly forty-minutes.
The #911 Porsche 911 RSR is in fourth, followed by the #912 Porsche 911 RSR which is in fifth. The #912 Porsche needed to make an unscheduled pitstop to repair a piece of bodywork that had gone astray after light contact with another car.
Jeff Westphal leads the way in GTD in the #63 Scuderia Corsa Weathertech Racing Ferrari 488 GT3. As it has been all day, though, controlling the lead in GTD means little as the top four cars in the class are within a second and a half of Westphal.
The championship-leading #86 Meyer Shank Racing Acura NSX has moved into the top three after hovering around the edges of the top five for most of the day. Mario Farnbacher is currently in the car trying to hound Westphal. Jan Heylen is in the #16 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R in third.
Still, only one GTD car has retired from the race, that being the #12 AIM Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC-F GT3 that fell victim to the water leak of the #4 Corvette earlier in the race. While cars in the pro classes of DPi and GTLM have run into trouble, the Pro-AM GTD class has been rock steady.
In LMP2, the story is the same with the #52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA 07 still leading the class, now with a three-lap lead. Provided they can keep the car clean and out of trouble, they look destined for a win in three hours.
The #8 Tower Motorsports by Starworks ORECA 07 is in second. The #38 Performance Tech Motorsports ORECA 07 is in third. After an earlier incident, the #51 Inter Europol ORECA 07 is still way off the back of the class. It’s now nineteen laps down.
