The #6 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963 of Mathieu Jaminet and Nick Tandy made a stirring comeback to win the Motul Course de Monterey at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, taking advantage of a late error from the #31 Whelen Engineering Cadillac Racing V-Series.R of Pipo Derani and Jack Aitken.
It’s Jaminet and Tandy’s first win of the IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship season – the fourth different set of GTP class winners on the year – and Team Penske’s 100th victory in professional sportscar racing.
But for the opening stanza of the race, it was the Chip Ganassi Racing #01 Cadillac of polesitter Sébastien Bourdais that dominated proceedings. Bourdais pulled out a ten-second lead over Derani after half an hour of racing, unchallenged at the front.
However, 49 minutes into the race, a piece of the #7 Porsche Penske Motorsport 963’s rear clip broke off and onto the racing line, bringing out the race’s only Full Course Yellow. But it was a costly one for Bourdais, who hadn’t pitted and lost all of his 24-second lead.
Taking advantage was the #31 team which had come in for its first pit stop prior to the FCY, and topped off under the Safety Car to put Aitken out in second place behind Tandy in the #6 Porsche – after some confusion on the order in which they left the pits. Aitken quickly got past Tandy soon after the restart and controlled the middle stint, and the #01 of Van der Zande followed through to restore a Cadillac 1-2.
But the #6 Porsche jumped back into contention after the final round of pit stops. Tandy took fuel only to jump ahead of Van der Zande into second place, and then tried to chase down race leader Aitken. The two ran tail-to-nose through GTD traffic, but it appeared Aitken would hold off Tandy.
That was until 12 minutes left, when both cars approached turn four and were baulked by the #3 Pratt Miller Motorsports Corvette Z06 GT3.R of Alexander Sims and the #86 MDK Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R of Anders Fjørdbach. Tandy tucked to the right of both GTD cars, while Aitken went left and off into the gravel – the one mistake he’d made all afternoon, and it turned out to be the biggest.
Tandy cruised to the chequered flag, giving the Porsche 963 two wins this weekend – following Hertz Team JOTA’s breakthrough WEC win at Spa-Francorchamps yesterday.
The #31 Cadillac of Derani and Aitken finished 5.7 seconds behind in second place – their third runner-up finish in four races this season, and another near-miss with victory.
Despite the damage earlier in the race, the #7 Penske Porsche (Dane Cameron/Felipe Nasr) would recover nicely to finish in third, and maintain their lead in the GTP Drivers’ standings after four races. Cameron and Nasr lead Derani and Aitken by 50 points.
The #40 Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Acura ARX-06 (Jordan Taylor/Louis Deletraz) finished in fourth, while the #01 Cadillac of Bourdais and Van der Zande slumped to fifth in the final stanza of the race – and finished just ahead of the #10 WTRAndretti Acura (Ricky Taylor/Filipe Albuquerque) and the best of the two Team RLL BMWs, the #25 BMW M Hybrid V8 (Connor de Phillippi/Nick Yelloly) in seventh.
Rexy the “GT3 Rawr” finally became the king of GTD Pro, as Seb Priaulx and Laurin Heinrich delivered a very popular GTD Pro win for the #77 AO Racing Porsche.
Heinrich restarted third after the FCY, behind the #9 Pfaff Motorsports McLaren GT3 EVO of Oliver Jarvis and the #4 Pratt Miller Motorsports Corvette of Tommy Milner. The young German quickly picked his way past Milner on the restart and pressured Jarvis for the class lead.
Then Rexy put his snout up the inside at turn six, passed the red and white McLaren, and stomped away to a big lead – never to be challenged.
It was the first IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship victory for AO Racing and drivers Heinrich and Priaulx – and a win that puts them in the GTD Pro standings after three races!
The #9 Pfaff McLaren of Jarvis and Marvin Kirchhöfer, in its red and white livery paying homage to the legendary three-time Formula One World Champion Ayrton Senna, finally made it to the chequered flag with a well-earned second-place finish.
The #4 Corvette of Milner and Nicky Catsburg, which led the opening stanza of the race in a Corvette 1-2, would end up finishing in third – followed by the #14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 (Jack Hawksworth/Ben Barnicoat) in fourth, who trail the AO Racing duo by 56 points in the table.
Meanwhile, an unfortunate cross-class collision denied Turner Motorsport a popular win of its own in GTD and opened the door for the #57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 of Russell Ward and Philip Ellis to get its third win of the season.
Ellis was running a strong second after taking over the #57 Mercedes and had caught race leader Robby Foley in the closing minutes. But with five minutes to go, Foley got bumped off at turn four by the #40 WTRAndretti Acura of Taylor, which allowed Ellis to slip through to the lead.
Following their victories at Daytona and Sebring, Ward and Ellis now head out of Laguna Seca with a massive 213-point lead over Foley and Patrick Gallagher, who finished a heartbreaking second in their #557 Turner BMW M4 GT3 – just minutes away from winning on the day that Turner Motorsport became the team with the most starts for BMW in professional racing history.
Despite a few late off-track moments, the #120 Wright Motorsports Porsche (Adam Adelson/Elliott Skeer) was able to hang onto third in class. Adelson and Skeer moved up nine places to get their second IMSA podium, ahead of the #32 Korthoff Preston Motorsports Mercedes (Mike Skeen/Mikaël Grenier), and the #45 WTRAndretti Lamborghini Huracán GT3 EVO2 (Kyle Marcelli/Danny Formal).
Images © Richard Dole, Jake Galstad / IMSA
