2022 Michelin GT Challenge at VIR

[Music] on a busy weekend of mortar motorsports endurance racing brings the world together and it's vir being testing out racing cars racing drivers engineers and all kinds of components since the late 1950s laid out in a huge area of green pleasant and ruling countryside in virginia it is still three and a quarter miles of some of the best racing tarmac anywhere in the world hello everybody in the hagerty global broadcast center i'm john hindoff jeremy shaw is alongside me and adam will be in the pit lane bringing uh the global sports car community together in sound and vision and on xm uh sirius xm two z raw seven as well as around the circuits here at v i r a race this afternoon that is the final of the sprint races the sprint challenge will be decided this afternoon it could be decided very early on because of the points situation the overall gtd championship could be decided this afternoon as well that's a little more complicated as for the circuit action areas an overtaking spot certainly down at turn one then follow my leader a little bit up through the snake and the climbing esses to turn 10 over the top of the rise possibly an opportunity at turn 12 not much breaking there certainly in the turn 14 which is the top of the roller coaster before you drop down through the hog pen at turn 17 but there are plenty of places that you can make mistakes and certainly lose some positions no big run off here if it's green it's going to be greasy and slippery and with the rising temperatures here the track temperature now 104 fahrenheit that is 32 celsius uh the sorry 40 celsius on the track 32 in the air that's 90 at fahrenheit that is going to make things very difficult indeed for the michelin tires drivers reporting the track is a little bit greasy madison snow will be leading off for the champions elect in the sprint cup category paul miller racing it's antonio garcia in the acura in the excuse me in the corvette in the lexus the pro lexus that's jack hawks with he thinks he's got a nicely balanced car in that number 14 and in the 16 that is the right porsche a little further back than ryan hardwick would like to be starting he's down in the 16th position overall heart of racing aston martin they've been on a good run of form recently and their um or their gtd car the number gtd pro card their number 23 will start on pool position ross gunn his first position pole position earned in insert competition and those cars on their warm-up lap at the moment jeremy shaw this one with a bit of look we'll have plenty of green and what we're going to see is plenty of flat out racing around this beautiful parkland circuit well we certainly are i mean these cars are very very closely matched uh it's going to be interesting to see particularly jack hawks with that uh vassar sullivan lexus carmen 14 has looked really fast this weekend as we talked about a while ago they had a little bit of a problem in qualifying but he had set the fastest time of the week before that but he's going to start at the back of the gtd pro field can he work his way through if i'm going to talk i better turn my mic up haven't i shouldn't i that was i wondered why i couldn't hear myself two hours and 40 minutes then on the clock uh new safety car for this weekend is the gt3 the 992 porsche 911 gt3 it is basically a road going version of the 992 cup car double wishborn front suspension six manual gearbox or the dsg take the three pedals you know you want to 510 horsepower or there abouts from the flat six normally aspirated four liter engine is that the best modern engine that porsche has produced oh that's a tough one but it's got to be right up there and in that bright yellow will not miss that one as much as i love the look of the sound of that car with its center lock wheels and it's michelin pilot sports tyres i really hope we don't see it again for the rest of the afternoon because that will mean that we've had 2 hours and 40 minutes of green flag racing not beyond the bounds of possibility here with a very very deep field 18 cars five at the front are all gtd pros that's where they're qualified there's no class split here paul sitter for gtd on the outside of rule three is russell ward and he heads 13 gt dear tornas in that windward racing mercedes emg gt3 standby for action as we're ready to go green beautiful pace being set by ross gurney gets the hammer down right in behind and matt campbell is dragged through with the porsche but bend him waving the green flag and the faf porsche is into second place for the moment big dive down the inside by hawksworth as he comes into turn one and he's taking the lead in gt uh but he's made up a position rather in that gtd pro no actually he hasn't i thought he'd gone through there on the bmw but connor de philippe just blocked him out the corvette's had a terrible start tonio garcia who got banged around a little bit earlier on in the week but enjoying his time here at vir so it's first part of the job done jeremy for ross gunn first earned pole position in him is a competition played that one like the pro that he is he certainly did and so did matt campbell right behind him he was virtually glued to the rear bumper of that aston martin as they took the green flag and he was able to because of that able to sneak ahead of antonio garcia at the first corner a little bit farther back down the field and notice that jaden conright in the uh nte ssr lamborghini caliber 42 managed to sneak ahead of frankie monte calvo as well in the backs of sullivan lexus so a little bit of shuffling positions on this opening lap the opportunity was the cars are bunched up to make those positions side by side the carbon lamborghini i and the number one of madison snow and we can now say oh off for jaden conrad he's got got off at the top of the roller coaster turned 14. now the car was slewing sideways as he pulled away but i don't think he's hit anything i think that was just a lack of grip on the green stuff green slippy rear grippy as we said now porsche keys to the race of michelin countdown agree that i don't see any damage i think he steered out yes he has adam tells me that he's gone by on the front straight as we're keeping an eye on what's going on at the front of the field so madison snow then in third position and we can confirm now that by starting the race our first champions of the season are paul miller racing didn't get the car for dear tornas who couldn't do the full season or indeed the endurance cup prioritized the sprint race championship and they have hit their target and won that championship we'll get a word with paul miller with sheer adam as the 42 is touring around at the moment in the early part of the lap we'll keep an eye on that while shear talks to a champion team order well paul millard now pommel racing has won every applicable imsa championship for gtd the overall championship in 2018 the endurance cup in 2020 sprint champions now how proud are you of this organization you know it's it's a fantastic testament to the work these guys have done and i'm very proud of them obviously but we we have a great team and so what can you say you can say congratulations and job well done oh congratulations to everybody here thank you thanks paul very rare that we get mr miller to talk to us but you could hear by his tone of voice the team was smiling a lot there as his team has completed the trifecta of championships and in fact will be the last winner of the sprint cup that goes away next year and they are the only team to have won all three versions of the mc weathertech sports car championship crowns nice little set the trophies back at the rare shop look like jaden conrad went straight on and turned 14 jeremy now that car had bragging issues earlier on in the week when jim was bringing it down to the paddock for its first practice session uh we're hearing the car is on fire now so that car out on the circuit we're hearing the car might be on fire if that is the case then we might see that bright yellow car they had breaking issues earlier on in the week has he picked up some debris the leaders have not passed him yet so and we're still under green where has he got to because he was traveling very very slowly [Music] there was definitely a mechanical failure of some sort in that car and jane did a sensational job to keep it off the barriers there at the uh at the top of the roller coaster he was uh got a little bit lucky as well because there just happened to be a gap where he could get through between the other cars that were just ahead of him but boy that was a scary moment for jaden he was able to continue around and then i think when he got down to turn one again he realized that problem was was still there yeah jeremy he was he was two three turns two and three but i think she had to be shortcut at the back of the paddock that was really smart that's exactly right john he paid attention to bobar fields drivers meeting earlier and learned through orange overlaps and the ways to safely get back to the paddock well he did and he stopped just outside of one of the tech tents the officials were there to meet him on the golf cart as well as his team with fire bottles i do not see any black smoke so that's the good news but that car probably not going to be rejoining well that's bad for them they've worked really hard to get that car into the race i say they have brake problems very early on in the weekend and adam has more on that go ahead many thanks to the team for letting me know there was no issue of fire they brought the fire bottles just in case it blew the motor really well very bad news for them what a horrible weekend they've had a bad news for the imsa diversity scholarship winner from last year jaden conrad won't get to race this weekend great looking car as well we'll take no further apart that's the number 42 nte ssr lamborghini huracan that's really annoying that jeremy isn't it when you work so hard for a weekend and you don't even complete the full racing lap yeah i really really disappoint you but as you say the crew works so hard on these cars to make sure they're uh as uh finally fettled as they could be but you know every now and again there's gonna be something that kind of slips through the cracks or whatever manifests itself in the early stages and that's what happened there for jayden conrad so very disappointing uh for him and uh you know i know he was he was super confident having a really strong car here this weekend the lamborghinis have looked good last few races particularly the car barn lamborghini car number 39 which is still running now in the fourth position um and jaden was really hopeful of a good strong result here leading into the final couple of races of the season see if we get a word with gin when he gets back to the pit lane he's normally uh very good about having a chat with us so drama early on and we're down to 17. at the front of the field ross good has managed to eke out a half a second lead doesn't sound much but in the big scheme of things that's handy at the moment from matt campbell in second he made the best of the starts of the fight gtd pro runners tony carson corvette shuffled back a wee bit but has recovered to fourth position ahead of conor de felipe and jack hawks with binding his time those separated by just on two seconds russell ward is another two seconds further back for winward racing he leads the gtd section of the race and the number 57 black and blue mercedes amg gt3 with aidan reed for rick ware racing in the multi-color but mainly sort of purple at number 51 rick ware accurate excuse me bmw and paul miller racing in the number one car how appropriate they lost their normal number 48 of course when the allied cadillac came to play a season or so ago but uh they've carried that number one with great pride and they have earned it again this year she top three in gtd separated by not very much at all as we're settling now jeremy into the race pace sitting around the early to mid 147s exactly i think where we thought it would be a couple of seconds away from how they qualified yesterday yeah and we're still a long long way away from the the la record here in in race trim for gtd was set back back in 2017 different tyres different lots of different things back then uh last year's fastest race lap was 145.0 but you know it's it's pretty darn warm out there today so i wouldn't expect to get anywhere near those track records though they've been looking to have the consistency now antonio garcia has just set the fastest lap of the race overall 147.198 in the third place number three corvette also robert mcgenis was just at the best time in the non-pro category at 147.4 it's jeremy shaw he's alongside mate john hindoff in the hagerty global broadcast center we've had 10 minutes of racing let's have a quick vp racing fuels update and john potler is in 70th position for magnus racing rob furry old team hardpoint number 99 car in 16th ryan hardwick for right motorsport in 15th in the blue and black porsche cooper mcnail in the white with red and blue strike 79 weathertech amg is in 14 13 for sullivan number 12 that's the black and yellow car robert de angelis has the 27th heart of racing aston martin in 12th position that's seventh in class now into the top six of gtd robbie 40 for turner motorsport wearing the liquid molly colours on the 96 this year fifth is mike skiing for ting caught up in the 32 card still from black cart robert mcginnis the car bomb with peregrine car missed that one dark greer with the bright green highlight stripes on that's 39 and fourth madison snow for paul miller racing in the bmw number one the total machine in third second in breed in that mindy purple uh acura s n s x and uh russell ward in the black and blue 57 leads as far as gtd pro it's aston from porsche as they go across the line from the bright yellow chevrolet corvette from the bmw and black and red from the black and yellow lexus which is right with conor philippe now that's your top secrets at top five 23 9 3 25 and 14 at the front of the field in the vp racing fuel in race update and a dive down the inside by hawk smith that was being set up jeremy coming on to the front straight he stalked his way back to connor de felipe pulls off the move at turn three into four that was a really nice move there by jack hawks with i was just about to say i thought he his car looked really fast he was kind of bottled up there behind call of duty philippe ruing that problem in qualifying where there was a a left rear suspension bolt came loose somehow on that number 14 car so he wasn't able to replicate the times he set in the earlier practice session but he was confident he had a good car uh he was less confident we'd be able to make passes around here but he judged that one perfectly and up now into fourth place for jack hawks with the caliber 14. the other lexus however frankie monte carlo he also struggled a bit in qualifying not showing much better pace in a race either down in eighth position at the moment in car number 12. yeah i've been an odd one uh that but uh plenty of time to go as we said in our porsche keys to the race it will be a couple of regular stops for these cars they could go 50 55 minutes 2040 minutes on the clock you could break that up what's that so that's 120 uh plus 40 that's 160 would it make sense to break that into three equal parts sort of if you can do that we've seen that work before the slight fly the oil with jeremy is that there is a minimum drive time across both classes for each of the drivers that they have to hit otherwise the car's not classified yeah i mean that's you're not going to want to stop making pizza earlier than 40 minutes in any case it's not really that much of a factor i don't think i don't think it'll pay it into too much i think even if you just do 40 minutes the next driver can just about do an hour on each of the scenes or certainly close to it uh so um yeah that's uh but it is certainly something to pay attention to new fastest lap of the race by the way by our race leader ross gunn 146 895 that time around only fractionally quicker than the other two who are pursuing him but steady is still a new benchmark there in gtd through program the hardpoint car climbing through the esses now with the lodges on the left-hand side what a wonderful place that is to spectate here hello to everybody listening to us around things circuits sirius xm one at two zero seven this weekend and around the world of course in sound and vision imsa radio.com video before you on the live video tab at the top left if you're bandwidth challenged or out and about i can't watch the video then go to the right hand side hit listen live rs2 is where you want to be that's where we always are that is the home of himself there's something on there 24 7 and 365. new fastest lap of the race for jack hawks with who's warming to his task and possibly jeremy that uh literally as well and he's quite warm out there 100 fahrenheit on the track that's 38 celsius it's it's right there in the window for the the michelin tires but you don't want to be pushing too hard too early when the car is very heavy and it looks to me as well jack hawks was coming into a sweet spot of performance for him the lexus and this michelets yeah so uh you know he's right he does have the pace in that car he closed in half a second on those three leaders on that last lap it's going to be another couple of laps or so before he can get himself right onto the tail perhaps of antonio garcia but you know historically for lexus tar wear rear tire where in particular was an issue but they worked so hard on that over the last several years this sullivan team have made big strides in looking after their rear tires and working in conjunction with the drivers as well make sure they don't have too much of a heavy right foot [Music] corvette versus porsche coming down to the top of the hill that lays down at the final corner it's called the roller coaster if you've ever driven a car down there you will absolutely understand why antonio garcia has matt campbell in his sights matt campbell along with his teammate matthew jamini the yossi and the frenchman have impressed porsche management enough for them to be handed an opportunity with the new porsche gtp car the 963. those cars running after petite them on at michelin race where road atlanta along with gtps for bmw acura and cadillac i'll bring you some news from that test over on our sister service and midweek motorsport in the coming weeks of course we will have full coverage coverage of mortal patila mom for you when we get to that last weekend in august last weekend in september first weekend in october with coverage starting from thursday and a special midweek motorsport on the wednesday from the hagerty global broadcast center in the michelin tower overlooking the start and finish line at the raceway always a pleasure to go back there another great natural terrain road circuits where drivers make a difference [Music] top four out of the oak tree corner conor felipe and the bmw drop back just a little bit from the leading four in gtd pro jeremy yes he has he dropped back by uh well more than two and a half seconds it's just two laps after oxford's got past him so clearly he doesn't seem to have to speed in that car at the moment but uh look he'll be well aware of the fact he doesn't want to burn off his stars he wants to keep that mystery and robert in good shape towards the end of the scent as well and he he certainly won't want to lose too much ground though but he can stay within two or three seconds and keep those tires working at their at their optimal performance level then you know he can he can maintain that pace and perhaps close in again before the pit stops and perhaps he's saving a little bit of fuel as well out there in that fifth position meantime in gtd russell ward's not getting away from uh aiden reed the gap between those so it's around about a second and actually aiden reed set a new best lap of the race in gtd uh a 147.3 for the australian in that second place calendar 51. and that's why that gap has come down robbie fawley and bill oberlin driving together again this weekend for turner and the liquid molly cart he's staring at the back of mike skeene's number 32 team caught off motorsport and sixth and fifth and gtd they're just going up through the snake now under the bridge and heading into those uphill s's really really cool part of the track to drive i remember my first ever laps here yet [Music] so throwing the keys to a porsche 911 one of the then insert the lms vitesse cars and uh told to go and do a course closing lap in close formation and you said mustang oh really do i have to and i was i had to stay in close formation because i had no clue where the track went jeremy so if i'd lost lost sight of the car in front of me i would have been really in trouble yeah i mean look there are several places on this on this track where you know sight lines are a problem because there's so many blind brows here it's a it's a it's a real challenging racetrack no question [Music] behind a corvette that has been uh uh driven with uh some gusto because it was a course closing lap and we're all doing no more than two car lengths between you it's a lot of fun thank you patty and jason foot let me do that was patty i was chasing at the time he was a particularly good peddler patty hughes [Music] two hours and 20 minutes to go so that is what we've had 20 we've had 20 minutes so halfway getting on for halfway through the minimum drive time but nobody thinking about coming in at the moment as ross gunn still leads out the battle between antonio garcia and matt campbell hasn't really ignited yet it's been bubbling just simmering and jack hawks with holding a watching brief reminds me a little bit jeremy this of the early rounds of a of a world heavyweight boxing fight i feel we're seeing a little bit of sparring here um nobody perhaps showing their hand too early on they'll be burning the fuel off getting the tires into the right sort of area but no need to throw it away at this part of the race i i completely agree with you there uh epic and uh i think there's some fuel save going on here as well they want to stretch this fuel load so you can get to an hour that would be great just gives them more of a window in a lot of stages in this race so you know they're going to be kept they're being careful at the moment as you say i think they describe it absolutely perfectly there john hindoff because no one is pushing absolutely to the limit at the moment as i say that russell ward actually sets the best lap in gtd the leader extends his lead finally well a little bit finally over a aiden reed in second place 1471 then for russell ward is a gtd leader yeah the reason i say that is not just the lap times i'm just watching how i was talking about precision driving earlier on and you know doing the demo laps it is almost as if they are staying three or four car lengths away from each other making sure there's air getting to the radiators uh making sure they're not right up underneath somebody's tail pipes and rear wing um and at this point in time they're all i think you're right jeremy i think they're all hitting fuel numbers and i wonder perhaps if the bmw just burned a little bit too much earlier on because having dropped back by two and a half seconds he's sitting at about 2.7 2.8 he hasn't dropped back any further that's going to delete me that i'm talking about there indeed so in his lap time last time i was pretty much identical to the race leader ross gunn so yeah i think he's kind of settled into a rhythm here uh is is that last laptop de philippe term was less than half of a tenth of a second away from his fastest lap on the race so again good rhythm there good uh consistency that's what you need at this stage in the race it's a little bit different than gtt where aiden reed and russell ward are trading fastest laps it's russell ward in the 57 wynwood races uh amg gt3 who has that at the moment but they are having a little bit more rebuttal they're talking to about a second and a half now just three tenths further back madison snow for paul miller racing and then another second and a half to robert mcginnis in the number 39 the car bar the dark rear with bright green stripes on that car so just a little bit of ducking and weaving jabbing perhaps but no big overhand punches no hair makers being thrown just at the moment does seem as though the faf porsche is just closing in a tiny bit on ross gunn though but no real well not what i would call a proper opportunity to pass as yet as in breed comes through he's dropping into the clutches of madison snow and he's almost two seconds back now jeremy from russell ward who is driving his own race but uh dictating the pace in gtd 47-1 the best for russell ward uh just around about three tenths of a second away from the best gtd brawl up and indeed he's last lap was a 47-5 against the 47-5 of the leaders kind of underlying underlining jeremy what we're seeing there about people piercing themselves in these early stages yeah i totally agree and just look it's nice of the battle developing towards the back of the field actually gtd cooper mcneil is running in a ninth position the economy is 79 but he's got ryan hardwick right behind him and rob ferriel i would drop back a little bit in the hardpoint number 99 car has now closed in on that little to make it a three-car battle for that position 79 16 and 99 so hats off there to to rob he's got his uh you know he's got a good rhythm going days edging away just itching away a little bit at least it was until that last lap over john potter in the number 44 magnus racing aston martin how much it playing in to the mindset is the the championship and where we are in the championship one big race to come after this one the ten hours of mature patilamond at michelin respite roared atlanta in uh what just about a month's and you don't want to go and have to rebuild the whole car if you've totaled it either good points here are great and the championship might still be open to you by again the time you get there our other porsche keys to race track position and pit stops they kind of play together when do you take your pit stops what strategy is it two tires four tires are you gonna play the safety car game if the safety car comes out how far through your stint do you have to be before you consider doing a top off to extend your uh to extend your run [Music] all things that we'll keep an eye on adam uh hearing us talking about what's going on has been quizzing some of the gtd pro teams about the piece of the tactics early on here at vir the imsa weathertech sports car championship michelin gt challenge they're not in a fuel save because they wanted to be in a fuel safe from the start of the race john it's more as tired and as the tires hit their peak and started to wear off after qualifying that's why we've seen the pace drop down just ever so slightly from gtd pro they're making the best of the situation that means that they are now in more of a fuel safe mode trying to elongate the stint but everybody looking at hitting that minimum drive time of 40 minutes still that's the main focus for both gtd pro and gtd and then we're going to see a flurry of pit stops as people want to get off these qualifying tires it was hot yesterday during qualifying they got abused then they're being abused during the start of this race too that's a very good point here very good point thank you for asking the question and thank you to the teams as ever it's tactical of course it is but uh throughout the years that i've been working here in the imsa panic got to see it that we've had great access from our reporters and indeed from jeremy and myself when we're allowed out of the hagerty global broadcast i said that and always good to have a chat with these teams and if you're here at the track this weekend you will know what sort of access you have if you're planning already the date for next year is out it will feature the uvp racing fuel sports car challenge which is lmp3s and gt4s on the track at the same time for a 45 minute sprint event two of them across the weekend so start planning your return visit to beautiful vir now and if you're within a reasonable drive of razzleton georgia and you haven't done it already i heartily suggest that you start thinking about mortal kombat and the finale we're going to set it up rather nicely with the final short race of the season for the gts and the gtd pros and we go into the season ending 10 hour race on that uh last weekend in august first weekend of september it is going to be an absolute belter and john what are you determined as as reasonable yeah well yes good good point he's good points look yeah it's uh just look at that again the lap times the lead the last uh six laps by by ross gunn at the lead of this race have all been within a tenth and a half basically i mean really consistent pace been run by the title racing aston martin the englishman there just doing exactly what he wants to do at this stage in the race uh jack hawks was just flipped back a little bit on that last i don't really slip somewhere or or not but you know that everybody i think we're pretty happy with where they are at the moment and the fifth place car conor d felipe he's just turned his best lap off the race to to get within two seconds once again of jack hawks who's running in fourth so now 30 minutes down and this early part of the race everybody very cagey as jeremy said earlier on can make a mistake here that has quite big consequences a little bit of a miss of the apex going into the first part of or three there by the mike game driven court of motorsport carried a lot of speed over the rise through 10 and up into 11 and 12. and that's just compromised he's exit from oak tree a little bit we still call it the york tree the oak tree's been gone many many years by lightning of course i'm pretty certain you can still buy souvenirs which uh include a bit of the old tree here at the track and the the circuits souvenir shop it's the old tree pub i think isn't it yes it is yeah absolutely so now we're starting to see things close up in jtd crawl with ross gunn staring at the anti-visa rearview mirror at the plaid front end of the porsche and then it's the corvette then it's the lexus kind of philippe that's still sitting just about two seconds 2.3 seconds behind that top quartet staying out of the way driving his own race in clear air because of course all of these cars have very similar performance the they'll be a lot less lapping and in fact with the leaders coming up to aucklary now john potner is already through turn one so that's pretty much the field spread out in in what half a lap in terms of the lap length if not in the lap time it's uh 45 seconds between front to back so actually that is just just under half a lap in time as well so it will be a wee while before these cars if everybody carries on and does what they need to do and pith stops notwithstanding it'll be quite a while before we see any lappery going on so again that's going to cut down the opportunity for one of those uh opportunist maneuvers that we often see but what we're seeing here jeremy is real pace being set um at the pace of the cars all right slowed down a little bit but we're seeing the relative strength and weaknesses of these cars and this as i said this is just the opening stanza yeah there's still a fair bit of sparring going on here and they could go quite a bit quicker if they need to or want to i think at this stage in the race and uh you know all of them i think they're just trying to trying to save a bit of fuel if they can take on a little bit less less fuel than everybody else at their final stop maybe they can leapfrog somebody and and make a position there in the pit lane because clearly it's a lot easier to make a pass in the pits than it is out on a racetrack and because they're not pushing absolutely to the limit right now the there are very very few mistakes being made out on the racetrack and what jeremy's seeing there about putting on extra fuel and why that's important you can change your driver at and certainly two and possibly four tires in well inside the time it takes you to put pretty much a full tank of vp racing fuel in these cars so you're sitting there waiting for the fuel probe to come out that's the determining factor on how long your stationary in the pit lane so if you can save a couple of seconds worth of fuel fill that's a couple of seconds that's a real couple of seconds that you're saving on your rivals in the pit lane that might take two or three laps for you to make up out on the circuit so if you can be a little less heavy with the right foot if there's a bit of lift and cost going on here a little bit of short shifting on the gaze now taking it all the way up to the last little blue light on the dashboard to change up then that could be a massive dividend in that last pit stop and that's what jeremy's talking about that hearing from adam jeremy that there is some activity on the wall of the car bomb with peregrine lamborghini team the 39 car and just one tire there for robert robert mcguinness so perhaps uh thought that they have a tire going down so we'll keep an eye on that with share in the pit lane sorry jeremy are you no i was just going to say that rob farial must have made a mistake somewhere in the middle sector on that last lap because all of a sudden he lost seven seconds to that battle that he was having with cooper mcneill and ryan hardwick so maybe it was like an oak tree turn i don't know where it was but somewhere on that lap he had a uh a whoopsie of some sort and he's dropped back but who hasn't dropped back is colin d felipe who's just turned his last lap was just seven thousands away from his best lap of the race and he is closing in now on those top four cars and uh yeah pit stops there's still little ways away yet i mean probably 20 minutes away from another pit stop but again like i said earlier on he's quite happy to slip back a little bit in the very early stages but he wants to be right there or there about when it does come time for the pit stops [Music] adam down in the pit lane uh what's going on down at car bomb well for carbon it was an instance of them having a left rear tire up on the wall they then called the mc officials out to ask if they could go to the far wall in between the track and the pit lane to look for any damage i went out there with them i looked as well i didn't see anything they've got their refueler up on the wall still but we are getting very close to making it to minimum drive time so if rob mcginnis can hang it out out there until they are able to bring the car into the pit lane they'll get a much better idea of what kind of damage is on the car where it came from and how to fix it really slowing him down jeremy if there is something they may have seen something on the data from the cars of course that comes to the big wall you can have data from pitch to cars but not from uh from cast to pitch rather but uh can't make any adjustments over the air from the pits to the car you can't talk the driver though these cars are incredibly sophisticated in terms of of data i remember looking at a relatively julia formula car a couple of years ago the renault clear cup over in the uk and that was more date they were they were taking in more data at the greater and a much greater sampling rate than we were when we were running the salinas 7rs a few years ago in the uh the equivalent of the world endurance championship in here in himself and that seems like five minutes away to me all right i know it's 20 years before anybody says anything yes i know but uh even so these cars yes they are based on your street cars and i know they're called the gt3s but my goodness me jeremy these are proper race cars particularly the new bmw which is built uh to take account of the new gt3 regulations which was potentially seeing cars uh similar to this going to le mans in three or four years tonight yeah indeed so certainly a huge amount of interest in gt3 and or gtd they are synonymous yeah in around the globe these days i mean they're they're great cars they're readily available you can get parts nice and easily uh they're not cheap no racing is cheap but they're you know more more moderately well priced um but you know it's it's relatively affordable racing in this day and age just look at these various things going on here rob ferial i wonder whether he might try to make a pass on reinhardt because hardwood fell back a little bit from cooper mcneil just a couple of laps ago and it clearly incensed rob because he's just had his best lap of the race uh two best two best laps in the race in the last suit two two times around uh also jack hawks with as uh as uh being closed in again now by colin d felipe who's within a second or just about a second so that gap is it was out to as high as 2.9 seconds from uh hawks with his fourth position and colin d felipe in fifth it's now just around about one second so that sort of gives a a little bit of credence to what we were saying earlier on that nobody is on the ragged edge here jeremy and in fact you know the spectators around the circuit are watching what we're watching as well here at the hanging global broadcast center that the body language of the cars don't doesn't suggest that either particularly in gtd pro it is a bit full of my leader at the moment but uh it just suggests to me that these cars will be evenly matched and we're not seeing how quickly they can go but that means there's some racing still to go in these cars and that they are being saved for later on in the race uh we will have had next time around the 40 minutes now i don't think the gtd pro oh it's 45 of course isn't it not 40 here so 40 minutes this time by um so it's going to be another three laps jeremy before that 45 minute minimum drive time is up do you see the gd pros coming in straight away and putting their second drivers in or will they go all the way to the end of their fuel it might be different between the pros and the geds i think it might be different between the pros and the gtds and i think where your your second driver is significantly faster than they will be in the earliest opportunity i'm thinking here particularly cooper mcneill ryan hardwick uh rob ferriel the guys at the the tail end of the field i would expect them to come in at the earliest opportunity john potter don't know he's having fun out there at the moment so andy lally might have to wait a little while this wasn't part of that that magnus racing team's original program for the season they were just going to do the michelin endurance cup just for four long distance races daytona sebring watkins glen and michigan roadway road atlanta but uh they wanted to do some testing before uh the motool petit le mans uh but unfortunately with the with the lingering effects of of of the pandemic and everything else and materials not being available michelin doesn't have enough tasks for everybody to go to do as much testing as they would like so they weren't willing to well they weren't they weren't willing to allow some types of use for testing but if you want to go race yeah we'll give you tires to go race with so that's why wranglers racing is here uh and uh you know andy is certainly grateful for that opportunity and you can't not michelin for that if if you you know if you're having as everyone is we all know this if there are shortages of materials shortages and supply shortages around the world you have to prioritize the people who want to go and raise i don't think anybody over down the paddock has a problem with that i want to check in with we are a couple of minutes away from this 45-minute shoot what are you seeing jeremy and i can talk about it we're watching the cars out on the on the track uh thanks to our camera operators and those i think charlotte who are feeding us the pictures back here to vir and the haggadi global broadcast center what are you seeing on the track i see a bmw right ahead of me it's a white one with liquemaliana oh it's turner motorsports nice of robbie foley to come say hi he is staying aboard this turner motorsport bmw fuel and four sticker tires no opportunity yet for bill auberlin to climb aboard he's actually sitting up there looking rather legibly so robbie foley will be double stinting to start this race the bmw is already a very pushy car to drive as far as the air conditioning is concerned so robbie happy to stay aboard for this one as we wait on the fuel as far as the gtd pro category is concerned all of those second drivers are getting ready for their stints john edwards is already coming in and waiting to climb aboard the number 25 bmw we've got alex roberts taking his cooling vest off to climb aboard the 23 heart of racing aston martin jordan taylor getting ready to relieve antonio garcia from starting duties in the corvette and we've got matthew jamine who just took off a t-shirt put on his long underwear to go underneath the fire suit and he will be putting on his helmet soon too as well and i saw ben vardyko smiling as he was zipping up his fire suit getting ready to put on his helmet so as far as pro is concerned driver changes all around that's interesting yes it is interesting john and the and the the thinking here for turner motorsport is robbie foley is fast these days he he's learned so much from working bill with bill obviously his last few years robbie's signific is very quick in his own right to already had a pole position this season and the thinking behind this stop is bring him in early let's get him out there did they change tires sure i think you said they did four brand new four yeah so get out now turn some quick laps on these fresh tires and hopefully he can leapfrog the car that he was kind of stuck behind he was losing a bit of ground to some of the other cars he was kind of stuck behind my skin they'd fallen about three seconds behind robert mcginnis who in turn was about three seconds behind the three leaders who were only separated by a couple of seconds so the strategy there is get him out of fresh starts turn some fast laps now and maybe leapfrog these other guys before they make their pit stops yeah and the point of what jeremy is saying there is he's got new taste yes he's full of vp racing fuel but those new michelin tires have a performance advantage over the tyres on his competitor cars that were around him that had done qualifying in the very very hot conditions that we had in qualifying yesterday and they've got 25 laps on them now as well so there's bound to be a performance advantage doesn't have to be that much half a second here a couple of tenths there and in three or four tenths at three or four laps he's potentially made up a second or a second and a half and that could leap frog three or four places in that gtd running and that is why they have taken the opportunity he's in elegant isolation at the moment he's going through turn one right now and the next car in front of them is the number 44 magnus john potter driven aston and that's coming out of turn five and heading up through the snake and up to the esses at seven eight nine and ten so he's probably got two or three laps before he hits any traffic and this is his time to shine jeremy in those two three or four laps traffic for who for robbie he's not going to no he's going to be over here he's absolutely going to be on his own uh but he's just gone purple in section one has robbie foley taking advantage of those new tires and that's where you see you you made the point there you need to really nail it now for several laps yes to leapfrog several of those cars ahead of him and uh he he's been told now push hard we can see that the mystery entire seem to be standing up really really well in even in these hot conditions so you know you run the risk sometimes at least or pushing too hard too soon on a fresh set of tires but that team must be confident that uh robbie if he's gonna go go fast which he is now purple again there in sector two so that you know the times will still be in great shape all the way through the stint yeah which would probably be a little bit shorter this middle stint for robbie yeah he's he's taking seconds out of uh john potler who was just on nine seconds up the road from so he's got at least three or four laps before he catches him that was the point i was i was making a lot more than that but i think john uh will be coming into the pits fairly shortly anyway and share uh you've got a slew of gt cars cooper mcneil in the weathertech racing car uh you've got right motorsport and team hardpoint rolling tires for weathertech mercedes they have put juliganyan aboard the car remember he's driving a bit injured with a hurt back after that crash in practice one on friday it was we'll not crash but when he ran wide off the track so he is now behind the wheel the 79 weathertech mercedes with sticker tires we've got john halen aboard the right motorsport porsche at the first opportunity of asking yon who considers virginia almost a second home now as this is the land where his wife is from so honorary member of virginia uh he now is all we already back out on tractor so well that was a quick stop parade again they won both of the pit stop demos earlier too so they proved that they were very quick rob burial has handed over to catherine leggett the hardpoint racing porsche and in the first of our gtd pro stoppers this is corvette fuel tires sticker tires for jordan taylor who's taking over antonio garcia we've got more gtd cars on the pit lane 39 is in for carbon with their lamborghini rob mcginnis getting out handing over to jeff westfall we've got fuel and tires and maxim martin coming aboard the number 27 heart of racing aston martin and our championship leader and happy birthday to stephen mcelroy getting an opportunity to drive his mercedes for the first time today he's taking over for mike skeen that's the sound of jordan taylor getting some pete in the michelin i think he's effectively burned off the stickers up and down the rest of the pit lane all going according to plan [Music] thank you very hectic down there with everybody on the same sort of strategy one of our porsche keys to the race when you take the pit stops well it's only turner who jumped out first of all and i would say he's gonna he's gonna win big time jeremy even just for those couple of three laps he's just reset the fast to stop the race twice at a 45 635 and that is the overall fastest lap of the race that's faster than any of the gtd pros as well and that leapfrog that you were suggesting that's worked really well for turner motorsport good thinking down there at the 96 crew absolutely right it's it's made him up for well at least one position we'll have to wait and see when everybody else comes out of the pit lane but meantime the race leaders are staying out and maddie campbell's just turned his best lap at the race on on on this lap 21 well grievous that 147.00 all the way around and she is pointing back in the right direction again it was coming down through the roller coaster but she's pointing in the right direction and she hasn't lost too much time as in comes the gtd leader that is the number 57 car for russell ward hawks within as well for vassa sullivan in the 14 and aidan reid second in gtt as well that's going to leave madison snow for paul miller racing out in the leader gtd shay the old tires but no driver change for the 14 bastard sullivan lexus so it is still hawksburg stayed aboard that car he did get stickers though it is fuel and driver changes for both the acura from rickway racing and the 57 windward racing mercedes the slow tire change on the right front for windward as they're running back around the front of the car to try and change the left front wheel this is a terrible stop for windward they have lost the lead as out goes aidan reed once again he has not yet handed over to ryan eversley but they did give aidan stickers now we go phil ellis is back out and away i think they had a wheel gun issue failure there for windward racing because they had to bring the one from the right front all the way around to the left front as well yeah and robbie fawley went by them as well whilst they were stationary where where was the turner car before they pitted jeremy where were they sitting in the gtd's i know you'll have that on your lap chart six right right behind the number 32 car right well they're well ahead of the 32 yeah of aiden reed as well so they're probably going to take the leapfrog their way all the way to the lead conceivably yeah catherine just losing it going down the hill last time around as ross gunn comes in from the lead of the motor race i'm just trying to pick up uh where robbie is he's got past john potner now so behind him is aidan reed i think he's leading the race i think he's leading the motor race as he comes around so i think he's gone from six to the lead of gtd when the other cars come in it's going to be very close indeed cheer what's going on with you fueling tires only for the heart of racing number 23 that is the pro car as in comes frankie montecalvo he will be getting out of this car handing over to aaron thiele to standing up on the wall fuel and sticker michelin's for aaron he's gonna be a happy boy lead of gtd he's certainly the leader uh robbie fawley is the leader of the cars who have stopped at a gtd it'll all depend where frank montecalvo comes out but he'll be behind him because he was well back and madison snow so madison snow is the the only variable on that at the moment new fastest lap of the race in gtd pro uh but still not faster than robbie pro robbie fully jeremy for uh jordan taylor in the vet that's right again fresh stars and for for jordan taylor he's taking full advantage of those but uh you're right he's still a tenth of a second a little bit more behind robbie foley that was a great left by robbie well i said it was his time to shine he is absolutely he was glowing there uh that was a super bitter strategy from the team and a brilliant piece of execution by robbie fawley they left him in the car he knows where the grip is he knows what the track's like i think that was a really smart idea to make that work jeremy as the faf cart comes in to the pit lane for matt campbell and cheer adam will watch this one for us this is fuel tires and a matthew change as jam jam is taking over for camp cam i'm gonna try and start that uh matthew campbell started the race and it is matthew jamie who's taking over fuel and tires we've also got madison snow in from the lead of the race in the number one paul miller racing bmw fuel four tires a new drinks bottle and brian sellers installed behind the wheel of this one the tire change is done just waiting on the fuel at this point brian is ready to go let's see how much fuel they put in the car right now the corvette is coming by still waiting the porsche is still in its stop as well so the corvette has jumped the fat porsche during this uh pit stop sequence and it will not get out ahead of the aston martin though now we see madison snow's car leaving the pit box with brian sellers aboard here comes foley john is going to be a close one into turn one and it's fully they have gone from sixth to first as he breaks now the pitlin speed limit coming off the bmw so in gtd that is super strategy from turner bmw saw the performance potential jeremy and the the opportunity there the strategy call was great and the execution by robbie fawley absolutely superb sixth to first in gtd yeah excellent job uh by that uh by that team uh and uh they've once again don salama there who calls the strategies for turner motorsport he's always on top of the game uh but as you said a little while ago it takes robbie foley to deliver that's exactly what he's done and uh now he's in the lead he'll be cutting down that cutting back that pace maintain that advantage trying to save some fuel and you know that's one part of the strategy to get himself into the lead the tricky bit though is to stay there adam's a radio if you'd like to get in touch with us and use the hashtag michelinprt if there's any questions points are rising or things you've noticed and exclusively on imsa ridge or rs2 we will be running through those at the end of this race which is still an hour and three quarters away battle for position in gtd brawl as ross good is right in behind matthias and this is a battle for position ross good has been in since the start jamming it is coming to complete his first lap in the car after this first pit stop and i i think she if we could get the uh the two matthews the max the two mats in a porsche 963 shulee it has to be kamjam um we've have van gaal in the past [Music] so it's got to be kamjam if they're driving together turn one then three-car battling gtd pro for jamie ross good and jack hawks with still there as well connor de felipe still out in front has not stopped yet in that bmw he's got 46 seconds on the field so again jeremy his different strategy playing out from rear hal uh letterman lanigan at the bmw m4 yeah and they're playing it the the opposite to turner motorsport they're looking to to make their time on the final pit stops they're going to stay at longer now it'll probably cost them some time to the other car as the other cars are out there turning really fast laps at the moment but to accommodate philippe's last lap he was only three tenths of a second away from his fastest lap of the race so he's turning really good good lap set at the front of the field and this will mean yeah he's absolutely well out in front now 45 seconds ahead everybody else uh we'll watch that gap see how that diminishes uh if if at all it did actually by about a second on the last lap so he said you're going to lose some time to those other guys but it's a long long way to go here he is now into the bits and it is a driver change and some replacement michelin tires are there new they look like they are sticker tires so shared my ear the corvette is coming through turn 17 on the front straight now waiting on the vp racing fuel to be delivered up to 30 seconds stationary now that's what a full tank of fuel is going to cost you through goes the corvette here comes the battle between chamonix gun and hawks with the bmw is down and away and he will drop in behind that three-car battle but in fairness he's not that far behind he's going to have to i think give best to the other bmw the little molly car so that's a great improvement from where the turner bmw was sitting in what 11th position overall and now they're fifth and leading their class that's an extraordinary turnaround showing that performance differential that jeremy was talking about for coming in and being able to run in clear air that was that was the key part of that if they dropped him jeremy into the back of the gtd field that wouldn't have worked so well for them but he got clear air he only caught john porter i think for the lap maybe a lap and a half before uh john came into the pit lane and and that was all the that was all the invitation that robbie foley needed true get on with it and you do that's what he was told and he did [Music] like that battle resumed here in uh gtd pro uh jordan taylor with that uh pretty big lead now uh they they came in a couple of laps before well one lap before the jack hawks was two before the number 23 aston martin three before number nine car and five laps before number 25 so different strategies here and uh yes it's made a difference now but what will it mean later on uh matthew jamie is just uh the second place carl's fastest laptop race that's the fast porsche and red plaid porsche that is fascinating absolutely fascinating i'm loving this just coming up to the hour to be completed in about a minute 40 seconds time it is jordan taylor then here's your vp racing fuel in race update john tiller leads by the better partner 10 seconds in the number three corvette having taken the door from antonio garcia matcha chamonix has taken over the five motorsports from matty campbell that's the porsche the nine-plan porsche he's about eight tenths of a second ahead of ross gunn who was in at the start for heart of racing aston martin in the 23. jack hawks with also started for vassa sullivan the lexus rcf gt3 the black and yellow number 14. he's another eight tenths further back in fifth position john edwards is now in gtd pro john edwards is in fifth sixth overall and he has just taken over that car he's 21 seconds away from jordan taylor and the lead of the race the biggest turnaround as we've been talking about turner motorsport coming in relatively early and robbie fawley stayed it they came in the end of 23 laps so robbie's been out there for nine laps already but the performance advantage that they had from a brand new set of sticker michelin slick tyres was massive and they went from sixth to first in their class and from eleventh to fifth in the overall standings so 96 leads for the liquid molly turner morton sport bmw in gtd aiden reid is about six seconds further back for rick ware racing uh for acura in second this is the number 51 car eight and started that car stephen mcauley has taken over the team caught off mercedes the amg gt3 it's the number 32. he's about another 21 seconds further back from aidan reid and i'll give you a better run on the brian sellers paul miller racing car when they come across the line which they will do any second now i'm just looking across there he goes i just wait for the time they are in third position now because there's a problem for stephen mcalee who is running very slowly indeed this is a disaster for magalia sounds like the car was misfiring this is not the birthday presents that stephen mcaleer wanted and he is touring back to the pit lane adam it looks like the team are aware of the issue and they're coming up on the pit wall yep and john i actually asked you is there something wrong with this car because i could see the panic going on down with the team they are ready to receive him and he is coming down the pit lane let's see the car sounds a little bit off steven brings it into the pit box there's no damage to the car there's no obvious signs that there is something wrong but they have gotten the blocks out to look at it engine off they're looking at the right rear of the car so maybe it's something within the right rear of the suspension oh championship leaders coming into this race john yes exactly championship leaders and this is the only full championship that uh steven is contending this year and i'm so looking forward to going to petite they've got the blocks out in case they want to go underneath the car but now the question here is have they found no well the right hand side they think is all right so now they're looking at the left hand side stephen left side hub is loose here is that the problem that's what was just reported back by the team i believe the car is going to be rolling behind the wall let's see are they sending him back out on the track or sending him hard left no they're sending him back out on the track maybe it was just the wheel maybe the wheel was loose oh let's hope not seated not seated properly correct off the lead lap that's what they were looking at and looking to make sure the hub hadn't come loose it's a quick turnaround but it must have happened just as he'd gone across the start finish like jeremy because that was a very slow in-lap three and a half minutes to get in to the pit lane so it happened at the most inopportune moment but well done to stephen for identifying the problem uh it sounded i thought it was misfiring but that must just have been the vibration that was coming from the rear axle and that is the championship leader trying to be coming into this weekend yeah it is and that's going to be absolutely critical it's going to be awfully difficult to make up that deficit that that car now faces really disappointing for that team because uh you know they were they were running really nicely they've actually made they actually made up a couple of positions on that round of pit stops but now they're going to lose it all and quite a lot more and once you're a lap down here it's awfully difficult in this gt only race to make up uh that kind of uh that kind of margin yeah that was one of our porsche case there is there's no class split here uh there's no pass around nowhere buys because you have no other categories effectively this is a single class race uh there's two different points scoring uh capabilities for gtd prawn gtd but they won't be split if we do have to have the intervention of the porsche 992 gt3 safety car now the other championship contenders a heart of racing aston martin and the number 16 right motorsports porsche so all all i think now stephen can do for team cordov is to try and minimize the damage and in some way shoot a form try and grab back any points they can but that is gonna be so difficult jeremy to get three and a quarter miles back on the field well yeah i mean there's basically no way i mean these cars are so closely matched that there's no way they can do that really and this is looking uh really good right now for the harlem racing aston martin team because they came into this weekend only 45 points behind they're in third position um but um they got closer after after qualifying and now very much in the mix uh and it's also i mean it's great news for i mean it's just going to tighten up the championship basically with ryan hardwick and jan halen they are second in points coming to here but they're only running right now in the ninth position so they're only three positions ahead of uh of stephen mcaleer so if that remains the same actually that mclear will remain ahead of hardwick inhaler in the points but uh long long way to go yet yeah exactly let's not get too far into that how far back are the uh are the 27 car the maxim martin parker only three only three points that are out of second so that's what i'm saying they're right there they're they've got a great opportunity to take over the points lead it's just of course it's just uh roman d'angelis who is uh is in uh in with that with the opportunity there because uh maxine didn't drive the first two races they didn't all always drive the car together did they correct yeah okay just uh well you know seems like there's nothing happening on the track but the stuff happening on the track and the stuff happening that has championship implications one thing we know for certain mentioned it once we got underway congratulations to the guys at paul milleration if you're just joining us here on instagram with uh some weathertech sports car championship michelin gt challenge at vir yeah congratulations to paul miller for the sprint cup challenge uh i'm not content with that uh you know that branch sellers here is uh is hurrying aidan reed for second place in gtd that be they're heading up underneath the bridge and up now through the the climbing s's and there's nothing to choose between those two they've been pretty much tied together since the sardine race in actual fact same positions they were right at the beginning but uh still nothing to choose between the right nose to tail uh ron so there has been a driver change in that car aiden reed however has been in since the start so it won't be until the final stop who he will hand over that number 51 car to ryan everson minimum drive time of 45 minutes so once we're getting close to that at the end of the race if the starting drivers is still in we'll point that out to you i don't think that will be the case here you don't want to get the caught the wrong side of a safety car but again the main fact that there's only one class here is that once the safety car brings the field under control all the cars can come into the pit lane so you're not having to wait a lot or so extra which could be at road america that was five and a half six minutes and that could really mess your calculations up on drive time etc and it's not going to be that situation here it's generally sean john heintov in the hagerty global broadcast center adam is in the pit lane first drivers some of the first drivers are out of their cars they're rehydrating shear is patrolling the pits and we'll get a word with one or two of them in just a few moments time with 9-0 minutes well to the pedance among you 92 minutes and 9 seconds still remaining in this race plenty of racing still left a kg opening 45 minutes or thereabouts nothing seemingly much happening until turner motorsport brought ranks and brought in robbie fawley early it was a genius move jumped them up from sixth to lead the class and from 11th to fifth uh overall actually they've just dropped back to sixth as john edwards has worked his way back through the gtt runners but nevertheless that's the big story in the first stint of this race jeremy and so far so good all clean and green around the beautiful vir circuit yeah and we saw the same sort of thing last year in gtlm here there were different strategies as to how they ran their tyres and their fuel uh during the race and there was some ebbs and flows in who was leading and and who was who was chasing uh right now though it's it's jordan taylor in that corvette he's got a pretty handy lead actually extended it a little bit it was a little bit less than 10 seconds now a little bit more but not by much more than that ross gun he's kind of settled in there just about a second behind the porsche in third place with the aston martin jack hawks with similar margin back and forth then john edwards who's been edging just a little bit closer he's made a tenth or two of a second of a lap over the last five or six laps over jack hawks with in in gtd pretty interesting there with that problem in the pit stop number 57 car fell from the lead down to sixth place but that is uh regularly the fastest car on the track now is finally brian sellers finds a way past uh aiden read up into second position closing on those two had been both jeff westfall in the carbon lamborghini and maxine martin in the uh aston martin and then right behind them again now is the fastest car on the track in gtd that is phil ellis in the wynwood racing mercedes let's head down to adam will keep an eye on the battles just a little bit of a bump and run by brian sellers on the 51 of edinburgh going into the first corner there i think if i'd been the team i might have asked him to give that back straight away and do the instant redress there might be called for that i'm not seeing that that's being looked at at the moment it was the tiniest of touches but that's all you need when the car's on the ragged edge of adhesion uh let's find out from some of the drivers who started the race how conditions are this afternoon antonio garcia from corvettes this year adam antonio i always love coming over to talk to you and your car's in the lead but it's especially sweet when there's a little bit of a gap between you guys and the rest of the competition the start of the race was so tight how much did you enjoy that battling uh as always you never know how much you can push so i probably timed it not really well the start so the nine was very strong off the bat there and he almost passed into it but i had to leave a couple times otherwise i would have gone in the grass but i had to play a little bit safe i think we had we had the place and i knew their ways so i just stay there i try to keep pushing more pressure in the high car for sure trying not to make them save too much fuel so so in the end that was the game saving tires and saving fuel is very very hot so i think it played out very well because we we kind of caught everybody maybe and undercut everybody had a big gap but yeah it's going to be yellows or maybe not so yeah we just throw this in a great job so that's why it matters well you certainly know how to win here having done it three times before do you think the race would be different from the start to maybe if you got in to finish it do you think it would be more aggressive more elbows out oh no it depends on when you are in the car if you are the bikini you need to keep the car safe so in order to the next guy to fight for the win so there is times to put their walls out and first lap wasn't that time good luck the rest of the way [Music] thank you adam down there in the pit lane and a couple of black and blue cars having a big battle at the moment and that is part of racing's maxim martin having a good scrap with phil ellis who's taking over from russell ward as uh they're having a scrap at the moment for what is that sixth and seventh in gtd excuse me fifth and sixth in uh gtt porsche leads chevrolet leads porsche elite aston leads lexus leads bmw in pro it's two bmws at the front of gtd as brian sellers just uh eased his way past eden reads and pushed the accurate into third position then the lamborghini huracan then the aston then the mercedes then the lexus so plenty of variety on shore here jeremy this weekend at vir yeah absolutely right and uh that uh pass was reviewed by race control no action they say um okay um it certainly looked like the number 51 car was just noticed a little bit out of line there bump and run as you say that's not just not the way bryan sellers generally plays things must admit but it looked that way but anyhow no no action there no no penalty will be assessed uh and so he will take over that second place in the class and see if he can track down the leader which of course is robbie foley in that gtd class a little bit farther back uh catherine legend andy lally uh looks like they have a little bit of fun they've added ali has closed in a gap of about about four and a half seconds over the last seven or eight laps and they're supposed to in that nose-to-tail 99 and a 44 car so that's a fun little bell to watch it in fact they're just about to be lapped there goes antonio garcia past uh andy lally so he allows the corvette to go through and andy lally will try and tag onto the tail end of that of that corvette and hopefully follow him past casper when they catch her let's go to adam down in the pit lane at bmw bill auberlin yesterday robbie foley said he was in a fuel saving mode so he wasn't pushing very hard is that why you're making him double stint to start this one you want him to get his sweat on this weekend yeah he's he's working hard this week it is the um well we did the undercut and it was very powerful because the tires on his second stint made so much grip that he went right by everybody in theoretical time there uh now we're going to pay for it on the next step we have a long a much longer stop coming because we got to take on more fuel to get to the end so that gap that you see we need every bit of it otherwise we're going to get jumped again but at least it got us a little bit up the up the road there you know how to win at var this is the way to do it isn't it yes it's a good way right i mean it's better to to lead it's very hard to pass here because it's very high speed so uh when somebody takes the aerodynamics off your nose it's hard to get by but we got the birthday boy here don salama at the helm here calling the shots he's always great and the turner guys do great pit stops so i just got to do my job try to win this thing we've done it plenty of times before go earn some tacos tonight bill good luck thank you uh the reference to tacos if you're not a regular here on aims race coverage that is how turner motorsport celebrate victories it will be a tackle night if they win here this weekend under an hour and a half to go now jeremy so getting in towards the uh middle part of the race an hour and 23 minutes still to go so what that's that's 80 minutes uh we started off with uh an hour and a 2 hours and 40 so 160 so we're getting down towards half distance here now aren't we yeah just a couple of minutes away from half this is absolutely right look at this battle here that's developed for third position in gtd aiden reed coming under increasing pressure from not only jeff westfall but also back to martial philadelphia and aaron thielitz is closing as well in at number 12 vassal sullivan lexus so we got a uh one two three four five uh five car battle there because the car that's tailored to that train is stephen mclear he is still a lap down to all of these cars these pieces there though that's going to be frustrating for them to have dropped that lap with the loose wheel after the pit stop [Music] if he can't pick his way through and try and get laps back on some of those cars ahead of him sir he's got andy lally is a laptop cathode leg is also a laptop so just got past those two yeah okay good so so he's moved up has he to 15th position that's extra points for him who no he hasn't moved up but no no no no he he's still quite a long way behind those two those who have just been like catherine leggett and i've just been laughing i've just been like that sorry yeah yeah yes 32 was like quite a long way before that so he's quite you he's another 40 seconds behind lapping about a second or so quicker than both of those a second or a second and a half so you don't have to be a genius to work out that if he's 30 odd seconds behind it's going to take him 30 odd laps to catch them never mind to pass them and we are 43 laps into this race for the leaders 42 and 41. for those at the back of the field so it will take him the rest of the race to make up that time and potentially make up a couple of of positions for another 10 or 20 points but that could be i mean if that's all he's racing for jeremy then that's what he's racing for and that's what the team will be trying to do now this is you know the the race victory's gone side by side by the way coming into turn four as the mcginnis lamborghini is straight through on the inside of hidden reed fantastic run there for jeff westphal of course that is in that car now on off for the heart of racing aston is it yes it is no no yes pushed off from the right-hand side of the track and has picked up one of the marker boards i think that's one of the weathertech boards that they're advertising at the moment the number 57 phil ellis just trying to go up the outside of aaron telitz and jules goon on full cross yellow full coarse yellow well now is that because we've spread something under the track it was a little mistake by aiden reed jeff westfall straight down the inside just a little bit of hip and shoulder then the aston went through that's what threw me off i'm i'm guessing that there's a sandbargo or some part of the signage has got onto the track the aster then comes under pressure from phil ellis who goes to the outside and two bits of the corex boarding picked up there and he loses the position to the [Music] car following why have we gone yellow well that's i don't know i presume that in picking up that sideboard jeremy something's been brought under the track that shouldn't be there that's the only thing i can think it was a little bit of ushered off to the side of the truck no no i think he'd have to i think he left him right now i think he left him room there and i think phillips just he made the decision that he was probably going to get pushed over the curb so run the other side of the curb rather than straddling it i for me there was nothing wrong there by either of those two slow moving car white flag on the track and that could be for the safety car which is out the yellow came out before the board was uh ejected from the front of the number 57 phil ellis i mean phil's lost very little time there and of course with the full course yellow he's lost no time at all but i think uh there's the other part of the sign is on the track i see there was two parts of that side one facing one where there's an earboard and one the other and i saw like a little triangle shape like a toblerone and what's happened there is i i knew it was the weathertech time because i saw the weathertech sign pointing forward then that blew off and left the other side where the weathertech was pointing in on the grill of the mercedes and it was just a white board so obviously what's happened is the other part of that a board is on the track somewhere and in fact tyler kinghorn has just sent a note to himself with a picture at himself thank you sir the sign is indeed sitting on the track right in front of him we have eyes everywhere on himself so bad news good news for phil ellis there bad news he's off the track and loses a couple of positions good news he manages to deposit i'm sure he didn't do this on purpose by the way but funny how look goes is this the piece of the uh the debris that is on the track is the the side that he picked up so well there you go now we are getting a pass around here jeremy i don't think there's anybody needs to pass around actually um okay well where's catherine and well race control i've just put out the message i thought there was no class split i've just seen prepare for and then commence pass around on the the channel now that that [Music] that stephen mclear unfortunately for him was not close enough because he was behind that whole train of cars correct so yeah that's that'll put catherine leg and andy lally who just exchanged positions by the way and he did get past catherine right before the caution period came out right so [Music] do we then put the gtd pros at the front of the field again we don't have to actually you're already there right okay yeah but but the the two g the two class cars the two gtd cars had not been lapped by their class leader that being uh was robbie foley so uh that's uh splendid news for them yes uh and bad news for stephen battalia because it would have been to catch those two cars up for a few extra points but the question is the question is now when the pits are opened who comes into the pits and who doesn't if everybody comes into the pits then steve mcauley elect team quarterback sports car can conceivably stay out get the lap back then he will be ahead of everybody else and behind the safety car before we go back to green because he is between the safety car and his class leader he will then get the pass around and he can then if he's quick enough duck into the pits take on service correct and hustle around and catch exactly and try and catch up the back of the pack trying to work out what yellow that uh porsche is i don't think it's paid to sample i don't think it's paid to sample signal yellow uh but it's very nice picture up for all cars so there's no split and there'll be no class reset of course after this that gt3 leads them down and it's a bright yellow chevy corvette that will have the opportunity to dive into the pits first of all share adam uh it's been you know 19 20 laps for some of these 22 for robbie fawley since they were in the pit so it's well into the well into the run the halfway through they've got to come in everyone's going to come in here on the ship sorry jeremy i got something well yes they are but this is bad news for robbie foley because we heard bill harland say because they came in early this is going to be a longer stop for them so they're going to be they're going to pay things very casually here adam not to lose ground during his round of hit stops yeah you're right jeremy and i have 17 teams up on the wall whether or not cloth or comes in this time no they stayed out mclear stayed out all right we've got the corvette and the porsche and the aston and the lexus and the bmw all five of the gtd pro cars into the lane in comes robbie pulley number one on the door he's getting out bill offlin is getting in let's see tires and fuel for every single car up and down the pit lane that did come into the print lane did not get andy lally or catherine leg and either the magnus aston or the hardpoint porsche but everybody else doing full service i see a driver change going on for the 14 lexus then barnacu jumping on board there i did not see oh yes there was a driver change for the 23 ask martin so now it is ross gunn who has gotten out of that car and alex rivera has taken over the first car back out and rolling with the 25 bmw the second car off and rolling was the number one bmw paul miller racing they blended with alexis right in front of them that would be the number 14. [Music] porsche first out of the pit lane after that uh exchange in the pits and that's exactly what i was talking about john the corvette of course because that came in before the other gtd pro cars had the same problem it needed more fuel there so has drops not behind one not behind two not behind three but behind four other cars so it now comes out he's got all that work to do again i talked about these different strategies fascinating motor race this is really cool so [Music] that yellow is the bottom line i i think that brian celes has jumped a few positions as well and i think he might be leading gtd of the cars that stopped andy lally and catherine legge didn't stop yeah so they've stayed out so we'll lead the race so that means stephen mcnally won't get his lap back even though he stayed out doesn't it yes so that's extraordinary well i wonder whether that was a strategic call there from aston martin quite frankly yeah correct because uh potentially porsche that's the martin porsche are the two are the two manufacturers absolutely uh now where are where are catherine and andy on the track because they've got the wave around of course [Applause] let me see they may come in at the end of this lap stephen still might not get his lap back then in that case acura has changed drivers that was one of the cars that was still running in raid hand got out of the car to that point ryan eversley tightening his belt as he follows the safety car around and cars drop down see when they come back through so there's macale had just gone through [Music] onto the lead lap again and saw presumably still hasn't come in to the pit lane no he hasn't so he's going down at the turn one now so i've got past the start finish line the safety car is coming to turn 17. [Music] and stephen mike i'm i'm thinking that andy lally and catherine legge are right in behind the safety car i don't think they're coming in jeremy i don't think they're coming in but stephen mcnally is on the end of the lead lap if he can hustle around he's going up through the yes's now and safety cars in turn one he's making back some time but he's not going that quickly i would have thought he would have been pushing on a little bit to get in and get a splash of fuel and then drive on uh 70 minutes 7-0 penalties uh seven zero minutes coming final wave by is happening now and so which which there shouldn't be the the the question might say what happened to the heart of racing team number 23 aston martin because all of a sudden that's gone from third place overall to four teams so a disastrous pit stop for a harder racing team that's going to cost them massively the other loser there is ryan eversley in the uh we're racing acura he's gone all the way down he's behind uh rib rash and behind jan halen as well so he's down into the you know the early car he's ahead of his stephen mcaleer who didn't come into the pits just now didn't he no he's going straight through again i i think i don't think he had time to jeremy because he's still not on the back he's nobody he certainly would have had time to duck in now take on the service and get back on like he might not be able to catch up with the back but at least he'd be back on the lead lap and then if there's another full caution he's right there but as it is now he's gonna need another pit stop you know fairly soon he was in 14 laps ago yeah they're on the wall for him strangely didn't come in that lap [Music] because i think we're probably going to be going green next time around if not this time can you remember when he came in last time for the loose wheel yeah did this splash with fuel as well oh yes because that could be i mean yes they would have done john yeah yeah i i bet that's what they did so he's not quite as bad off as badly off the fuel as as perhaps we thought that so getting on the back of the train by doing better for track position uh than falling back off the lead lap again uh yeah and he's on the back of the train now he's on the back of the train now yeah excuse me john if if there's no more if there is no more full score course i think everybody's going to have to stop again yeah the track position here really really important and andy lally and catherine lake there they're up front out front right now um andy is certainly quicker than catherine his car has been quicker than catherine's it would appear during this race um you know he could he could run well here i'm going to go back to green though this time around he's got about i reckon he's got about uh another 10 laps that he can run 10 or 11 laps that he can run before he needs to come in jeremy so that's going to be the better part of 20 minutes that's going to take him well inside the time that he can make his last pitched up that last pitch up could be very short that's why they've stayed out that's that's really interesting because everybody else is going to have to do a last pit stop there could be the first of the last pit stop as if that makes any sense and that's what they're thinking at the moment gtd broadcast may well go through and we aren't under green again but they will cycle to the lead of gtd and andy lally's making his bid for freedom at the moment as he leads out in that astor barton it's a calculated gamble but from where they were jeremy what did they have to lose absolutely nothing i like it more good strategy absolutely right i mean they are going to need more fuel on their on their on their final stop than everybody else for sure so they'll lose ground there but nothing nothing ventured nothing gained there's a look at the outside of the bath porsche by the bmw whoa into oak tree and cars great envelope squared on board they on board [Applause] with the corvette of jordan taylor and jordan's already picked his way past brian sellers and was two michelin ties on the grass on the right-hand side going down madison avenue brian sellers getting a double tour there they barnacult lexus staying ahead for the moment because all those cars came out of the pitch with brand new michelin tires on and then sat behind the safety car so they are not up to temperature or pressure at all and that's why there's that much moving around of the cars and for the fact that they are really being leaned on none of the none of the little jabs and bobs and waves that we saw in the first part of the race now this is starting to get into the important part of the race and this is where as jeremy said track position is king being a position now this could be really important down the inside and turn one there's a problem for the lamborghini number 39 of carbon and that was coming together between that and the weathertech number 79 right rear is sparking now i i think it is just a rub on the body work just says heindorf is fine from the relative comfort uh of the hagerty global broadcast center and it wouldn't like to be in the car and having that happen actually it wasn't the weathertech car it was the 57 windward car that did it the weathertech car just came up behind it and there's just a little bit of bodywork rubbing on the front edge of the right rear wheel there jeremy on that uh on that number 39 uh car bomb with peregrine lamborghini and that was a bump and run i hate bump and runs yeah if that's not looked at i would be very very personally i'll be very very disappointed let alone uh jeff westfall the wheel of that lamborghini there because there's no question that the mercedes of phil has gone into the right rear quarter panel of that uh number 39 lamborghini and has pushed that bodywork i think onto the tyre and that's just not necessary don't like it at all adam down to the pit lane with penalties from that last pitch stop exchange the 51 rickro racing acro has already served its penalty its drive through for too many people working over the wall now we did have another penalty that's for car number 23 the pull sitter of gtd pro they did service outside of their box not allowed drive-through penalty for alex roberts as into the pit lane comes the carbon lamborghini now crawling on the pit lane speed limiter right rear is where the damage is let's see how severe it is it looks superficial honestly they're going to take the brand new michelin off now that hurts more than almost anything else sticker tires nowadays are almost invaluable and a little bit of carbon hanging down on the rear of the front part of the body work if that makes any sense they're going to put some gaffer tape on it and send jeff westball back out well there's the answer jeremy why are they 23 heartless racing aston who've just been through the pit lane why they were slow during the pits they were outside of the box or they let something go outside of the box so clearly a little bit of a fumble on that pit stop that dropped them down and now of course they've had to come through the pit lane they've dropped even further in terms of real estate on the rest of the gtd pros indeed so so yeah i think obviously miscue coming into the pits maybe they were unsighted by another team there whatever happened outside the pit box that's a no-no so that's uh add insult to injury there for that number 23 team and that's just not what they needed that's going to put them you know way way behind everybody else now in concert of course with west valley who's there's still nothing on on the on the uh race control feed here about about the instant being looked at i'm i'm surprised [Music] disappointed they've had to come in as well they lost 52 seconds stationary on the pit lane they mined the drive through andy lally still leaving leading catherine leg has let a few of the gt pro cards go through which i think is very very sensible in deed because she's not fighting that i remember that is the the backup car in some respects a bizarre incident where the trailer coming home from the previous race this season a wheelbarrowing seized and there was a small fire on the hauler which was dealt with very efficiently by the local fire brigade and it didn't spread at all so they used a lot of fire suppressant chemicals on it did some unexpected damage to the carbon fiber of the plastic inside the race trailer including on the car and that car is being stripped down and rebuilt and so this is the car that uh we saw with hardpoint earlier in the season i think it's i think catherine put our hands up and said it was one of the ones i crashed earlier in the season remember whether she said it was sebring on tier 2 it was the secret car um so that car is out they're going to do some testing and there will be at mature patila vaughn at the end of next month and the beginning of october at the front of the field here's the battle for the lead coming out of oak tree andy lally has matcha gemini jamming on newer tyres in the porsche he's flashing andy lally all very well flashing andy lolly you're battling for the lead of the border race matt he's not going to just wave you by he's holding onto his line and chamonix wasn't close enough to get into an outbreaking maneuver at the top of the hill and andy lally he's not going to be intimidated by flashing lights of abortion behind him but i did that was quite funny that was quite that was entertaining if nothing happens it was wasn't it then andy lally was the only driver who competed in every single gtd race from the beginning of this championship 2014 up until the end of last season uh the only guy so he'd had more starts to everybody else of course this year he's only doing the long distance races so his record record number of starts has been taken away now uh it's now bill oberlin who's had more races than anybody else in this championship this is bill's 97th race here this weekend 95 is the second second for antonio garcia and i don't see andy lally's doing anything wrong here he's battling at the front of the race and he's got to keep his pace up chamonix will be getting frustrated he's waving left and right and he's staying on the racing line he's not even defending at the moment chamonix is not getting anywhere near him to be able to stick the car up the inside so this is marvelous stuff at the front of the race and furthermore john in fact those these two have pulled away yes they have from the rest of the pack on that last lap they were about uh you know well angela was he certainly he pulled away he edged out it was 1.6 and it was two seconds well i think you know what he might have lifted that uh and let the porsche go through could have done yeah he's on all tyres so he's not going to have the same ability to turn sharply and tighten up his life and maybe andy thinks i'll sit in behind that porsche and save a bit of fuel which wouldn't be the worst thing to do as hard as he can run and as long as he can run into this race and he's got about five or six laps left before he's gonna have to peel off in the pit lane but at that point we'll be getting on for well 50 minutes to go and and i think he can go to the end from there so that is job done he will be stationary for quite a long time as corvette and lexus are sitting together and the corvette goes through on the front straight on the lexus that's john taylor going past ben bernicut and the second of the lexus is right in there as well as brian sellers so a real mix of gtd prawn gtd now jeremy all on new tires all in the pits at the same time and all needing one more stop to go to the end if we stay green really interesting at this stage really interesting uh tremendous battles here developing and uh aaron t has done a really good job frankie multicalver kind of close onto the tail of that group before the early round of pitstops and aaron this has really got the hammer down here and he's up into well third place in in gtd because andy lally leads it on a different strategy to everybody else brian sellers is next and only just ahead of aaron right behind guaranteed it's his vaccine martial in that heart racing team astomation looking potentially to take over the points lead then it's bill oberlin right there in fifth place and phil ellis in six who seems to got away with that bump and run adam i i'd like you to pop down to keep team court off please because they've just brought stephen mcaleer in 20 laps on that stint but obviously he's not on new tyres the lap the tires are 27 laps old so they were coming to the end of their use for life i i suspect that was more grip limited than fuel limited on that stuff but 57-58 minutes to go jeremy that's going to be a stretch for stephen mcelroy in now 16th i will have dropped back the 17th position again behind oh no he hasn't he's got out in front of jeff westfall so he's still a position better off than he was earlier on yeah and and will have made now his final pistol i think he gets the end from here oh yeah uh so i i don't think that's going to be an issue for him and he's the last car to make to make a first car to make his last bit stop if it goes green all the way and even if there's a very short yellow uh the others even then might need to make a pit stop in any case so uh i think a great strategy by team courtois well let's find out is mike skate with adam from the team all right mike are you good the first of the last stoppers is that what's going on steven can make it 58 minutes on a tank of fuel yeah we should be good to go from here a little bit of a stretch maybe but i think we're right on the number guys did a good final stop and uh he's got a good car so hopefully we get a little lucky here with some yellows or something to catch up but uh yeah looking good the problem that brought you guys in 20 something laps ago that was a loose wheel that's what it looks like we'll have to review the footage and make sure uh it's a little bit tough to understand because it was several laps after the stop so it wasn't an immediate loose wheel but maybe you know some issue there that we haven't discovered yet but um yeah you guys did an awesome stop to give us a really good position in that early stop and uh it's a bit gutting to end up where we are right now but hopefully we can establish something yeah nothing to lose why not roll the dice good luck mike thank you leaders let's not forget so this will be all about how far up the field stephen can get kathryn legg has stopped and she's fallen behind that court of car and i think shield goon on has just stopped as well oh he's investing he's the first of the gtd pro cars coming in to the lane the corvette's back in andy lally is in to make his last stop and also coming in the 16 jan halen for right motorsport this has been triggered out of by stephen mcaleer they don't want to get on the wrong side of a full course yellow where are you i'm right across from the quarterback and the right notice more courses lots of fuel only for jordan taylor so they've gone away from their initial plans to put antonio garcia back in left side tires only for john halen and 12 seconds worth of fuel still waiting on andy lally's service to be completed but that's going to be a lot longer since he needed to put in a lot more fuel and they've done four tires on that asked them and there was no tires on the corvette is that correct no tires on the corvette left sides oddly on the porsche and all four are on the 44 magnus okay you got it thank you jeremy frantically scribbling away on his pad and his lap chart so that when we forget about that later on because we're of an age where we do that he will have a record of what happened at that last stop for those that were saying i know i know jeremy i've worked with you enough to know exactly what was what was going on there so stephen mangaly has made up a couple of positions then from where they were after that problem they were 17 they're now 15 doesn't sound like much but in the big scheme of things for the championship they're looking at van halen in the number 16 and they're looking at the number 27 which is in sixth position so third in class for maxine martin and the heart racing team here's the rest of the gtd profile actually no chamois hasn't come in but bmw team rll and vasa sullivan have so oberlin and uh ellis have gone through john edwards and ben barnika said oh puncture right rear puncture for magnus and the aston martin and so that car will have to come back in again as well so that's going to be another position made up for stephen mclean that car's just come out the pits what's happened there was the tire not seen it or has he had side-by-side contact not sure fuel only for lexus fuel and all four tires for the 25 gtd pro puma bmw more tool sponsorship on there as well well that is extraordinary for andy lally literally had just been in the pit lane and the right rear tire is off the rim now did he push too hard over a curve on the outlet jeremy ah surely not andy surely not handy that's not a mistake he would make very unlikely certainly yeah it's a uh real disappointment because they had a really really good run going there they were certainly going to lose some time you know making that longer pit stop there but they called it strategy absolutely perfectly but now that's going to put them right at the back sure adam will hustle on down there and find out if that was contact or some other travail that has befallen them 52 minutes to go and oh that is that riya tire isn't coming off that easily either as faf are in from the lead matcha jabani heading down towards you with 51 and a half minutes to go how many tires and how much fuel that's the question well it's gonna be at least the left side tires no at least the rear tires that's the change that they are doing for the fat porsche and waiting on the fueling the guy is still on the hood of the car now he goes out wow just a splash of fuel but new rear tires for the porsche so that's four tires for the bmw no tires for the corvette and just rears for the porsche different strategies for everybody we've had the full set apart from a set of fronts on there uh left side which are the working side here at vir we've had all four we've had none and now we've had real tires only for the porsche you've got to be a bit careful with that although they haven't been out there that long have they bought some nine laps or so kind of set actually a little bit more than that out 11 laps but even so you can't upset the balance of the car jeremy changing the at the backs uh adjust the backs and it'll be a couple of laps before that sorts itself out for mafia jamming here he'll uh he'll have plenty of heat in the front tires and nothing at all in the box but that rear engine porsche should warm them up fairly quickly i would have thought yeah i'm just wondering why the 20 number 25 car is so far back compared to the other cars [Music] they did have a 35 second stationary pit stop on their stop they have made their third stop so they're good to the end but they weren't stationary for a little bit longer but they did do all four tyres that's correct not that that's well maybe they took a little bit extra time so they wouldn't have needed full fuel but they did do all four tires jeremy yeah so that may account for some of that well now we've gone from the analogy of a boxing match earlier on i am going to pull another one out from my sports watching of many years and this now is a bit like watching the relays the sprint reel is in athletics in track and field play it out because what we've got here now is we are waiting for the stagger to unwind there you go declan brendan knew exactly where i was going with that before i even started the sentence i bet because we've got such different tactics here brian sellers leads the morton race in gtd and overall but is yet to make their final stop there are 12 laps into the stint i don't believe i don't believe anybody who's 12 laps into their stint at the moment could go to the end another 50 minutes uh alex rivera came in for a splash there there i've been out eight laps ryan obviously has been out nine laps uh jan halen's only been out a couple so they think they can go it's gonna be very interesting uh magnus racing by the way she's already spoken to them thank you uh andy thinks he ran over something coming out of the pits which caused the problem on the right way by look can you jeremy no that's that's that's a heartbreaker for that team there's so much enthusiasm at magnus racing it's really cool and to have themselves in that position running up front for you know for several laps there and that's exactly what they needed saw the chevrolet looking at the back again of the porsche [Music] it's coming down to complete a another lap so still to stop we believe are the top five so seven i think stops top seven really okay well number twenty three car was that a penalty of that car yeah that was the power penalty so that's a good point well remember exactly yeah yeah so no i think top seven i think was the 51 a penalty as well too many people over the wall correct that was too many people over the wall so you're right jeremy it's the top seven matia jamin here with the battle that's going on with jordan taylor uh just at the moment uh heading uh up through the snake and up to the s's two turns five six and seven onwards uh is effectively the leader of the mortal race in terms of having done last pit stops that's the first car to have done the last pit stop jordan taylor jan halen bernice at all yeah barney is slipping back isn't he's he's slipping up behind jan haylen now who's really charging along uh and he is right in contention number six c car he has made his final stop and he's looking very very good all of a sudden yes yeah absolutely agree so 46 minutes 46 and a half minutes still to go a couple of warnings for a couple of cars failing to adhere to the requirements i have no idea what that means adam will find out um but only warnings for the third place heart of racing aston martin and maxine martin and the number 57 the fifth place phil ellis driven wynwood racing mercedes ah tyre requirements failing to adhere to tire requirements sorry i didn't read that properly on the screen there tired eyes obviously so she can possibly find out from our pit officials what tyre requirements they did not adhere to that got them a warning but at the moment no penalty for that the that was the 27th heart of racing aston and the 57 winwood racing mercedes amg failing to adhere to tyre requirements warnings for both so so not a pit lane jeremy that was one of the lexuses is is just uh straight a wheel off there and something seemed to fly off or fly up at the end of that string of dust that was thrown up in the air as well that was uh i think it was i think it was aaron t litz it must have run off the road there but the exit of return hopefully that car is all right [Music] yeah you don't want to be doing that we've seen damage being caused it was the windwood car wasn't it uh no it was the weathertech car excuse me they've had to pull out one of the practice sessions having uh run off the kerbs and then come back on again cause damage to the left rear suspension [Music] it's a good consistent lap speed turned here by brian cell it's about a second off we were off his ultimate best lap in the race the fastest car on track though is is jan halen at the moment in that right motor sports car number 16 he's running in 10th position but he's a lot better off than that in the overall strategies that's that's the thing at this stage jeremy um we're not sure who's pulled the right strategy there's not that much difference in the tyre performance of the cars that stopped they will be making a little bit of time but then what are we going to see at the end in terms of how quickly the fuel can go in and will the guys who haven't stopped being able to hold on to some of those seconds i i it's it's intriguing to me and that's why i love i love these races at 2040 i think they're a good length they're they're a sprint endurance race no doubt but there's still an endurance race for my liking and i do like it a lot agreed and this has been a particularly fascinating race i think there is jan halen pushing on his uh kind of kind of on his own at the moment because he's uh what's his gap to the corvette it's actually come down a little bit he's come down a little bit last few laps he's catching the corvette little by little has been over the last couple hours he's certainly pulled away from ben bernicket in that vessel alexa's caliber 14. meanwhile in gtd pro it's alex rubass who leads at the moment but i think he definitely owes us a bit stop so matthew jamine in that faf porsche is holding the advantage and he also had the advantage to think of better tyres new rear tyres on that porsche yeah he gets no tires for the corvette he's now beginning to stretch that lead just a little bit yeah i like these calls i i like it when we see people just thinking outside of the box a little bit we send in our porsche keys to the race what you're gonna do with the pit stops when you're gonna take them and what tire strategy are you going to use we had all four for the bmw none for the corvette one side for one of the other cars i think i was one of the gdps in fairness the left-hand side the working side tires and just rears has new michelins for the plaid porsche now the next thing i've got to look at jeremy's to see when those cars that haven't stopped how far they can actually go and then we well i think they've got another 10 laps probably 10 or 12 laps still if they want there what's that going to give them that's going to give them 20 minutes it's going to be a little 20 minute dash to the finish isn't it and they'll not need full tank of fuel but surely they'll have to they need a lot they need a lot more they can go a lot more than that that's for sure uh i mean i think you could do i mean connor d felipe on his first did 31 laps uh so he he was the longest yeah i'll be looking at 28-29 so yeah you're right if they could do that brian sellers has just clicked over 17 laps as is aaron t maxine barton and bill oberlin and phil ellis uh i'd i'd actually the same for um alex rieber he came for a drive-through in the middle of that uh ryan evans dc above comment uh so that top seven of all been out uh the top five rather of all six at all been out seven have all been out i'll come back to where i was because obviously i had to drive through as well i've all been out for 17 laps so they've got maybe 12 13 laps to go so [Music] what's that it's going to be 15 16 a bit more than that it's going to be 20 minutes so they're going to have 20 minutes to get to go at the end of the race aren't they but they have to put tatters on jeremy don't they they can't seriously think yeah if they've got new tyres or even if they've got part one tied better than they're on the shoot he can't think they're gonna get the kind of of performance at the end um even if they don't need a full tank of fuel which they won't correct but the tricky thing is there the longer you stay out the less fuel you need therefore the shorter the stock therefore the the the more pressure there is on the tire chain just to get that tire change done you don't want to waste any any extra time in the pit lane changing tires if the fuel fuel is already in so that's that's some yet another thing the teams kind of need to pay attention to yeah what they could be doing jeremy i'm just i'm just trying to figure that out how the number 25 car is so far behind what they could be doing at the front of the field is you need a finite amount of fuel so it doesn't matter um how far you go in if if you need 20 minutes of fuel you need 20 minutes of fuel but they might not have 20 minutes of fuel space in the tank right now so they'll be burning down to when they think they can get enough of the tank to get them to the end yeah and the the vassa sullivan team by the way thanks to kevin diamond uh the number 12 car which is currently running in in second place and hanging right with brian sellers uh they've told our teams he's gonna need six seconds of fuel uh sometime in the next 15 minutes so they've got plenty of plenty of time yet before they need to make a stop but that's when the the change was made you mentioned tires there it's not stupid he's kevin he's been around the sport a long long time um but um you know that that's so so what 38 minutes remaining in this race and we're expecting the lexus in sometime in the next 15. at the end of the race the chequered flag finishes the competition but it's only the start of our conversation michelin post race tech will continue uh after the chequered flag at the interviews jeremy'll crunch the numbers on the points shear will grab some people to talk to and you set the agenda in terms of what we talk about hashtag michelin prt at namza radio do you want questions answered is there something that you have seen that you don't understand points are rising what have you noticed what do you think about this format for the gt cars what do you think about vir if you're at the track at the moment how are you enjoying the upgrades and the new camping areas that have been opened up this year that haven't had access in previous years hashtag michigan prt at imsa radio after the checking flag stay with us on rs2 imsa radio let's do a quick vp racing field rundown with 37 minutes to go the gt pro fields are mixed in with the gtd so let's take it from the top number one is number one paul miller racing brian sellers leading by eight tenths of a second to aaron taylor to faster sullivan in the 12 in second place they're just heading up through to the bridge and heading up through the yes's now maxine martin is another five seconds further back for the number 27 heart of racing team then turner motorsport is right in behind them with the liquid molly car that's the 96 white with the red and blue flashes on that's billable and phil ellis is right there for wimbledon the black and blue number 57. then we have the first the gt d pros but we think these are these are all fueled to the finish where those top five may not be um actually alex reba is he's not because his extra pit stop was for the drive through wasn't it so mattia jamini is the first car we reckon fuel till the end in seventh position for faf motorsports then it's ryan episode for rick ware racing the number 51 their 16th class eighth overall john taylor for corvette is ninth the number three car but third in their class jan healing in the blue and black number 16 seventh in gtd but uh really effectively leading gtd in terms of the cars we think could go to the end from here that number 16 car in 10th overall ben barnika for faster sullivan the rcf gt3 is he serving a bit of fuel is that why he's dropped back the number 14 car in 11th position fourth in class jill screwed on for weathertech racing in the 79 the white mercedes amg is in 12th eighth in gtt john edwards for bmw team rl the 25 black and red car is in 13 fifth in gtt pro and then we've got the rest of gtd's ninth in gtd this is a bit of a fight back 14th overall for stephen magalia team caught off motorsport little bit of fuel saving required for him but he thinks they could get to the end may yet make up some more positions then it's catherine leg who is fueled to the end then it's jeff westfall and andy lally all fueled to the end ali uh andy lally a lap off the pace and that is the vp racing fuel in race update getting racy in that battle between bill auberlin and phil ellis but for the moment bill jeremy shaw has repelled the attentions of that emg yeah and both of them of course are behind maxie marta who is now slipping back at a fairly prodigious rate from the two leaders what are we looking at here in this replay it's the uh is is phil is trying another bump and run i hope not that was that was it i don't like this a couple of corners ago yeah and here he comes again to the left-hand side on madison avenue down towards down towards the top of the roller coaster it's all about respect this this this sport from my perspective and i know our chief steward who really does an excellent job beau barfield um he likes to he likes to say to drivers race other people like you would like to be raced yourself yeah i wouldn't like to be raced by the way that that pass was made earlier on by the windward racing uh message i think that's probably why he hasn't kind of pushed his luck so far since then because those who are falling back from the two leaders brancellis and aaron tinits are edging away now by about well the last few laps about a second a lap in actual effect over maxine martin who is just ahead of bill oblin and phil ellis so these two leaders brand sellers guaranteed it's number number one paul miller race of bmw and number 12 vassal sullivan lexus are pulling away now pretty rapidly from the rest tony very consistent laptop actually very good lap time last time well no yeah consistent laptops high 46's or very low 47's that'll do for now hello to simi rich and aaron has tweeted at himself radio they're on the grounds here at vir first time here the one of the last imsa tracks to visit on our bucket list of hitting them all an amazing facility wrapping up the race having walked up to oak tree and spectating from there loving listening to you all aaron and simi thank you very much for the tweet uh and don't forget at some stage to say thank you to the good folks at vir now kerrigan smith honey up to a great job there and the consistent uh investment and improvement in infrastructure for fans teams and us broadcasters alike is much appreciated looks an absolute picture again this weekend and as i said earlier some new areas to camp and depart been added to this huge area in which the track sits so delighted to see it we'll be back again next year the dates are already out by the way sorry imser.com next year's schedule already out announced at the state of the sport by john doonan at road america and all the details of which series is going well which sets of series and classes within the series for weathertech are going where are already having been announced so you can start planning 2023 2023 the uh the gtp comes back to insert weathertech sports car championship racing and i can't wait those cars look fantastic some worry that there might not be i've got them here this weekend they will be here next year some worry that they might not be as quick as the current dpis probably not quite as quick dpis are the fastest prototype endurance sports cars in the world right now by some margin but the initial testing has shown that the new gtps are plenty quick enough and a bit quicker than the simulations proof that the uh the drivers and the engineers can bring a bit more out of them than the ones and zeros in the sims do you think we saw what happened on that last lap did we john but all of a sudden phil ellis got bored sitting behind bill oblin and maxie martin he's gone past both of them oh wow now so up into third place for wynwood racing don't think we saw how that happened if it did i was looking away from the screen uh and he's already pulled out two seconds over maxie martin so uh phil ellis is once again super fast that's the car that won here uh what the last race i should say started on the pole position as well so it's been a really really good comeback after that uh after that problem earlier on they're a bit lucky probably with the full course caution uh but hey be lucky and good is is exactly what you want so we can see now how quick that car is and how quickly he could perhaps close in on those two leaders let's go down to share adam with news from the pit lane shay uh don't forget that 57 windward racing mercedes lost a ton of time on their first stop as well when they had an air gun failure and they had to bring the secondary one around the left front of the car yeah very well remembered thank you for that i knew that paid something i just couldn't bring it to your mind inside that's why we have shirts the other guy who's still flying is is jan halen who's good just got past ryan obviously a couple of laps to go left him far behind already by three seconds inside two laps so number 16 car up into ninth position and we reckon he's good to go on fuel and he is charging hard and uh on a pretty consistent basis he has been certainly up among the fastest cars on the track anyhow don't forget at imsa radio michelin prt let's have your submissions for our post race tech show we have a few interviews and see what else we can grab for you is jeremy will give you the all-important rundown of the numbers as we head into the final race of the year at motul patilla in just on a month's time reminder shameless plug for next weekend here on himself radio and into tv two rounds of the porsche carrera cup north america presented by visit cayman islands.com practice qualifying and both races from indianapolis motor speedway as part of the sports car together festival the second time that we've had the porsche sports car together festival and uh we'll be covering that for you as well and a new entrant for that race john yes oh yes yes yes god you do it yes god well uh ray evan ham racing will be back running a car there for none other than jeff gordon who has been itching to get back into he's watched the races he sees how much fun it is he wants to have a play he's going to do exactly that in indianapolis next weekend that is going to be fun to watch yeah and and i'm told that that was a car that jeff has bought that's not a giveaway from porsche it is not a guest car that a car that is a 992 carrera cup car that has been bought by jeff gordon he is obviously very senior in the hendrick organization uh and it'll be hendrick and ray evan hammersing who run that car next week and i can't wait uh i it's i mean there's going to be 34 35 cars on track together which makes it one of the biggest carrera cup fields in the world on the road cars of course at ims and jeff gordon um is back out of what is it nearly a decade now since he drove professionally and he is back racing in that porsche carrera presented by visit cayman islands next weekend we'll have both races and the qualifying sessions uh and indeed the practice sessions uh in audio but both races live on imsa radio and himself tv will have that video for you as well on the live video button around the world and here in the us and as i've never been inside the environs of indianapolis motor speedway i can tell you that i am very excited indeed for that trip i've driven past it once jeremy never had the chance to go there and work or to see racing there so i i am going to be totally tourist-bound and uh going to the uh go to the museum and we've got a couple of interviews to do with some of the the staff there and we'll have some of that on midway motorsport next week which my part of which will be live from indianapolis motor speedway that's three o'clock eastern on rs1 over on ridgeland.com next week as we build up to that it was a sanctioned pair of races next weekend and then we've only got a couple of weeks more the race before we're back together again at uh road outlander for motul patilamon traditional end of the season plenty of championships still up for grabs however possibly one all but one or potentially even one today if the results fall correctly in gtd brawl for the fact guys [Music] this is going to be a really interesting end to this race philosophy in that third position that with mercedes uh he's five seconds he's pulled out over maxine marta in just four laps so clearly no match there and uh the the the deficit to the leading pair it's now under six seconds it was seven and a half four laps ago when he got up into third position so he's getting a little bit closer but not he's not catching the two leaders as as quickly as he's pulling away from the two cars he's just overtaken adam down in the pit lane um any biting of nails any looking like people are getting up on the wall because we've still got the first what six cars that need to come into the pits for a splash of fuel and of course their pit boxes are nowhere near each other so i just keep walking back and forth and back and forth still no movement on any of the walls although i was told that lexus will be pitting soon although the crew guys uh they're not stressing themselves yet and the sun has moved into a positioned on but there is absolutely zero shade to be found on the actual pit lane so if you were to be standing on the wall you'd be out here melting like the officials and myself yes in your three layer nomex track temperature 37 celsius that's 98 fahrenheit air temperature 91 fahrenheit 33 celsius so toasty 56 humidity and goodness it's far more temperate than that in the haggardy global broadcast ascendant it's been a good drive by phil ellis in terms of his lap times little bit of contact that has raised an eyebrow or two uh here in the hangity global broadcast center but uh that mercedes showing no sign of damage the fg gt3 as he heads down towards the roller coaster for the 70 third time and 23 minutes to go jeremy what are we wrecking uh we've got those leading cars on 26 laps since the last pit stop um he said 31 you've seen somebody do 31 was the bmw wasn't it the rl bmw so maybe six or seven more minutes eight minutes possibly yeah yeah i don't think they're gonna have enough time to change tires that could be the critical thing and that's that's what's the the interesting part of this of this race for me and the strategies uh as to how many times you've got to put on these cars i'm not sure all right i'll put this out there you know i'm not sure what they were hoping for if there'd been another full course yellow then obviously they would have pitted but nobody else would have so they would have still dropped at the back but at least it would have given them time to put on a set of tyres and then try and fight that way through but as we said in the porsche keys to the wrist track position here is uh is pretty important and even with a a grip advantage yes you can make better lap times but those lap times making better black sometimes is predicated on the fact that you've got clear laps fighting past people is still going to be pretty hard yeah true that true that by the way uh ryan eversley as uh he must have some sort of a problem because he's slipping back quite rapidly now he's just been overtaken a couple of laps to go by both ben barnikas in number 14 car and jules gounion number 79 weathertech mercedes yeah but all of a sudden he's fallen quite a long way behind them as well and back into the clutches he was lifting before the starter start past cheer so it's it's a huge amount of fuel save if he's if he's trying to get to the end i see the point in that no i don't not when you're losing positions here here comes brian sellers from the front of the race so just we said about 20 minutes of fuel was what was required all right that was a minute 13 ouch here adam but it's all going to be down if they can get some tires on besides only for the paul miller racing bmw the old ones are off the stickers are on they're being sealed in air gun is being released from the back of the car brian is being sent he will blend out behind the corvette and behind the andy lally asked martin but i believe he's going to get out ahead of jan halen well let's see jan here that's coming to the start finish line now so that was working side ties no fashion blues just gone through helen's gone through so and here comes the second of the lexus as well so that's ben barnacult so he's got chill goon on right of his tailpipes so working side tires only left hand side tires only there jeremy but for the paul miller racing team that's their gambit for the the last 20 minutes of this race yeah and the the number 16 car has been nowhere in this race quite frankly uh up until you know that uh the restart here i mean it was running in 14th position uh before the round of pit stops was actually running 15th when we got the restart then a couple of penalties then yan turned some really good laps had their final pit stop back on lap 6 55 and now done 74 and he's been absolutely flying so it's been a tremendous performance by jan halen once again yeah he's been outstanding this year another note by the way uh that uh steven mackley has got past john edwards number 32 car then ahead of number 25 it's not a class gain for him but he's now a lot and he's also closing quite rapidly on ryan eversy and he's still running you know five seconds off the pace he must have a problem he can't be just saving fuel surely he's only nine seconds ahead of stephen mcnellier saw the uh the the fight back for that car was it was six seconds i i don't think that was six seconds she was closer than we were there i they did seem to struggle just a little bit getting the fuel nozzle in from my vantage points here but you were closer than me what could you see on that number 12 lexus the vasa sullivan car for aaron taylor well they lost about two seconds trying to get the fuel nozzle in and then they pulled the refueler after it had only been attached for three so that is very tight wow okay no tires of course there no time to do the tires with such a quick stop for aaron taylor yeah so this is where the stagger is going to unwind that's what this is what i was talking about earlier on at the front of the field phil ellis winwood racing maxine martin part of racing team as bill oberlin right up his aston martin uh rear end alex rieberas also has to stop he leads gtd pro at the moment so phil ellis with a healthy 10.2 second lead what's he got back to jan hayler that's what we've got to think he's got 30 seconds back to jan halen um so that's the time he's got to play it with i don't think that's enough i think that's probably four or five seconds short he's going across the start finish now the leader of the mortar is gtd and jan is coming to the top of the hill now and the roller coaster now that's not enough time that is not enough time he needs a good four or five seconds more than that to be somewhere dear still phil ellis is still out in front of course and uh he still needs to make a pit stop by my reckoning yeah that's what that's what i'm just saying yeah he is and he just went green in his final sector so he's pushing really really hard his fiddlers and that windward racing mercedes i i think he needs about four or five seconds more of a gap than he's got jeremy to to pressure jan halen um then it's another three seconds back to brian sellers uh and then it's another three seconds back to shield goon on that's who he's racing right now um aaron thielitz is in the mix there as well though isn't it he's about the same so those are the cars that they said that they're 29 30 31 32 33 so shields is 36. i think he can probably get in and out without the weathertech car going past brian is 32 call it 33 at the minute for paul miller racing that's too tight but both aaron taylor and jan halen are only 30 seconds and and i just don't think that's enough for phil ellis to get in get a splash of fuel and get back out again well the real question here john i think is did they get enough fuel in that lecture well you're in for was that they needed six seconds yeah it was that wasn't six seconds was it no it didn't look like it they were stationed what did you do for five six you somebody was counting too quickly yeah there was only stationary shares just said by the counter on the side of the car which tells you how long the car is stationary that was owning at five the fuel hose was fumbled and so at least a couple of seconds was wasted there so okay so yeah very interesting and uh phil alice has just had his best lap at the race 145.64 on that last lap uh max see marta and bill loblin are they trying to stretch their fuel to get to the end here because uh yeah they're only a second or so off their fastest laps but um there's no sign of blinking there i mean if there's a full course caution they could be okay but uh i don't know this is uh i mean i don't see how they could possibly stretch their fuel that far i mean it was an hour and eight minutes when we went green yeah and um i don't think that's doable i really don't but we're still 15 minutes jeremy 15 minutes potentially because the lap of course so it could be as much as 16 and a half minutes uh and in fact she's just told me that both of those teams now winwood and uh turner are on the wall no sign of heart of racing yet but winwood and turner are on the wall so that's imminent okay fine so uh and then looking for a bit farther back guarantee this just got out ahead of jan halen and brian sellers so those three cars are scrapping now for woody's at the moment seventh position overall no sign of partner racing team there on the wall yet so what do they do that we don't because you're absolutely certain that they're okay sorry i'll take this back i'll ask it as a question surely there won't be gambling at this stage of the championship remember our porsche keys to wrist thinking about the championship and the implications that that has particularly in the last 15 minutes of the race surely they're not going to be gambling their championship position which could be the lead of the championship jeremy by running the car out with out of fuel with three or four laps to go right agreed uh you you do you don't want to take that that's that's just being passed by by turner motorsport so martin phil ellis is 15 16 seconds up the road now auburn's just gone through a 49-6 for martin that time around the other thing is about fuel saving you can't decide a fuel save and stretch your fuel when you're in the last quarter of the last few laps of your tank you've got to do that from the beginning and losing three or four seconds a lap for the last five or six laps it's not the way to do this you've got to lose half a second the lap or three quarters of a second of a lab or lifting course jeremy right across the hall 32 laps to enter haven't you well you have uh which which you maybe has been doing but uh yeah bill aubley now is up into second position yeah and he lost more than two seconds to phil ellis on that last lap and meanwhile um matthew germany is absolutely flying along there in the in the next position uh tim fulbrook can faff take the championship today he's tweeted that himself he can't they can they need other things to go their way winning obviously they have to win and then it's about the other other championship uh positions turn a motorsport in bill oberlin out of second in the race with 12 minutes to go share adam start counting and tell me when that horse goes in one two three four five six seven eight eight seconds worth of fuel for bill auberlin wow okay that makes that stop by the lexus look even more dodgy jeremy i think it was a miscue i think that the when they started counting they they thought sadly when they thought the fuel nozzle went in i mean this is this is guesswork and i hope i'm wrong but uh it certainly uh yeah i think that could come back and order them yes absolutely so oberlin drops down to he's in behind the number 14 and there was 79 so he's seventh in gtd so he's still ahead of ryan eversley [Music] who is driving very slowly indeed um but he's still out there eversley and well actually do you know what he's picked up his pierce a bit of 48.2 last time around for ryan stephen magaly are doing a 48-3 is up to ninth position and that was looking i mean he speared up what three positions for team cordov he and the team have worked well after that issue with the loose wheel uh came in as championship leaders this weekend team caught off and he's only 1.3 seconds behind ryan eversley so he might even make up another position there and that'll be another handful of points looks like they could still hold on to the championship lead this weekend depending on where everybody else finishes jeremy that caught off mercedes team absolutely right yeah they're good and they're certainly trying hard to make that happen i think it's probably unlikely at this stage but uh look there's still there's still ten minutes to go in this race plus of course another uh ten hours a patilla mark but the gap between the the faf porsche and the corvette uh that's actually come down a bit last few nights it's around about three seconds i would imagine that matthew's jamily is just kind of managing things at this point uh because uh taylor was just a little bit quicker on that last up this super battle a little bit farther back down the road with helix having made that stop still ahead of jan halen who is struggling to keep brian sellers behind him settlers scores two fresh tyres on that bmw yeah until it's question mark over the fuel but hazmat is what they thought that was their last stop so this potentially is first second and third in gtd at the moment hearing that phil ellis for winwood racing will be in at the end of this lap that's going to be just under nine minutes [Music] and the now peels off into the pit lane where is phil there he is in the pit lane should have just looked out the window excellent adam watching this one one two three four five six seven eight nine nine seconds worth of fuel for phil so yeah the lexus stop the thing that's making me really nervous john there is no sign of life at heart of racing as far as coming in and making a pit stop for the 27. they've been out there for 35 laps now for maxine martin that's as much as we've seen anybody do any time during this race jeremy yeah so there's not the yellow yes true yeah there's some yellow in that i mean they would have brimfilled that car when it was last in but they've been out there time wise now for what uh six so well over an hour already uh an hour and ten getting on for an hour and eight minutes an hour and nine minutes uh as carbon are on the wall now yeah they just closed right up onto the tail of catherine leg jeff westfall has been charging along in that car that was the one who was punted off earlier on by number 57 and uh had some i guess puncture on the right rear so they lost cost them a lot of time and jeff's been charging highly just made it onto the tail of catherine lakeland try and challenge before position and now he's going to make a stop i think whoops who was that off the road uh that was all the aston martin that was let me work it out by where they are it was alex rieberas yeah in the pro cart number 23 that's the martin van dijk he's ahead of this battle for the net lead of gtd maxine martin oh here it is dalton down into the top of the roller coaster thought it was going to be a run down the inside for the number 16 porsche of jan halen um maxine martin at the moment powering the part of racing aston martin by the power of thought uh as well as the fumes of vp racing fuel entirely certain how they're doing this but this is outstanding stuff and still lead the motorist now chamonix is catching them they don't care about whether they win the race overall i guess they do of course they do it's fabulous to say they don't but that's not that important to them what they're thinking of why is there a number two on the side of that car it should be a number one uh on the side of max martin's car there's nobody else ahead of him in gtt anyway they they would love to win the race outright they would be delighted though if the two pro cars behind went through and no am cars did no gtd cars did so yeah so that phil ellis by the way is also the other car that owes us a stop doesn't it no no he's just been in oh yes he is rejoined ahead of that battle quite a long way ahead of that battle between tilitz halen and sellers right 16 and 1. so he's ahead of that lot so that's the net lead golden absolutely right if if martin either runs out of fuel or needs to stop yes absolutely right so it's been a tremendous charge there from uh from phil ellis is brian sellers trying to get a run again on that porsche of yanghai and he's going to pull sauce for a lot yes completely alongside him wow he's got it going into the top of the roller coaster it goes left first but then it goes right no that's a super move by both of those drivers now can that bmw deal with the front engine lexus rcf gt in front [Applause] meantime at the sharp end of the race phil ellis gives excuse me maxine martin gives up the race alex rieberas is in in the sister car now ribas was in at exactly the same time as maxine martin but he has had one further run down the pit lane for his drive through four seconds of fuel for the 23 car four seconds of fuel confirmed by shea as well as the digital counter on the side the cart four and a half minutes to go it's three more laps that's going to be 40 laps jeremy and only the first only the first one i think was under yellow that went straight back there but they were one or two uh oh bright's got past helens as well brian celeste come back steal it so now there's 11 seconds between uh brian sellers and phil ellis brian with those new left side michelin still will be giving a little bit of performance advantage the cars are getting lighter and lighter as well of course julie martin why would they gamble why would they gamble well i mean if they're this close if there was a full course caution they'd be they'd probably be be fine yeah yeah it's great so that's yeah i guess that's the gamble they're taking i mean they're a lot closer than i thought they were going to be that's for sure well that's because they've done uh an hour and they've done an hour and 13 minutes jeremy all right an hour and 13 minutes or 27 uh three to go and it's going to be two more uh gonna be two more laps i think [Music] two more laps after this one i think so that's extraordinary if they can make that happen absolutely extraordinary 38 laps completed so that's going to give them 41 laps on this tank of fuel i hope there's something in there they get the fuel sample because they'll be nearly dry surely this is extraordinary we've seen this before we have seen this before jeremy and it may be that martin was on full fuel save right from the beginning and running a lean map that's that's what i think has happened remember richard westbrook stunning us all at weathertech race with laguna seca that's where he got the pink buddy big fluffy buddy slippers comment from well they've just lost the lead in the class so that's phil ellis back to the lead in the windward car yeah he's been absolutely he's absolutely flying and he he's not a real possibility he could actually win this race overall i don't think he's quite going to catch those two ahead of him but he's absolutely flying but i reckon but that was the tenth lead change in this race by the way uh when the number nine car re regained a leader yes it did leave one lap earlier on yes it did yeah a couple couple of laps earlier on yeah on the pit stop uh turnover and does it change that yes sir number 79 car juice he's quite tired this time he's closing he's closed right here onto the tail of aaron thielitz and jan halen as well white flag this time around jeremy for the hagerty driveway faf porsche and matcha jabini has three seconds in hand jordan taylor for corvette racing is under pressure from phil ellis who's just assumed the lead of gtd maxine martin on fourth fuel save has three and a quarter miles to go and where is brian sellers he's eight seconds behind as he crossed the line my goodness me what a strategy and it could net them the championship lead going into mortual patilamon you know jeremy will be doing the arithmetic michelin post race tech to come we've seen it all here we've seen how cagey they were in the first run saving fuel all throughout the field side-by-side action bit of training paint a couple of bump and run maneuvers and some great pit stop strategy the last two hours and 39 minutes have had absolutely everything halfway around now and the leading three cars are all coming out under the backstreet at madison avenue they're all in the same tv shot [Music] down towards well you could almost caused him from here what about maxine martin in that's number 27 and where's brian sellers brian sellers is closing in on him they're halfway up madison adams avenue and sellers is closing in on martin that is nowhere near eight seconds now this could be a dash to the line any cuff or splitter from the 27 could see them give up another position but at the front of the field it's porsche power two rear michelin tires and some brilliant strategy from faf motorsports see them take the michelin gt challenge in this festival of gt racing at vir and they have done as much as they can to try and clinch the championship going through to win in gtd phil ellis and wynwood racing russell ward is with adam russell ward race winner once again in msu back to back wins for windward racing and four consecutive victories for you and the team the big momentum is on your side at the end of the season what's it like to be a winner at vir yeah i mean our first time here in the in the gt3 in the weathertech challenge and i mean man we make it so difficult for ourselves sometimes but the pace of the car was great especially on the older tires and i mean we just nailed the strategy so you know hats off to the crew fueler did a great job because that last pit stop was so critical you came in it was just perfect so awesome feeling great job congrats windward thank you two imsa wins two sro wins in their last four outings they are unbeaten and they will take that momentum into michelin road atlanta and motul patilamorn motorsports have won in gtd pro with jordan taylor just eight tenths of a second at the line it'll be ben bernicket for vassa sullivan in third fourth alex roberts for heart racing aston martin fifth bmw don't think jeremy that's quite enough on the point side of things for faf to clinch the championship but i think they don't have to do very much more than start and petite them on did it no i think that's what it boils down to it depends how many cars we're gonna have a few more cars in gtd pro for uh petite lamar i believe so that that'll uh you know that'll that means it's hot it's impossible to say right now whether that's clinching but certainly yeah they they do need to start that final race at the very least uh but this will move corvette back up into second position now ahead of the vassar sullivan 14 car so garcia and taylor now have got points they're now it's at uh 14 points uh 16 points ahead of ben barnikas and maddie campbell's on 31.73 so he's got a lead now of 265 points which is a pretty stout lead and it's going to be very difficult to to send back that back to win number five on the season for fafsa it's a brilliant run for them yeah absolutely brilliant and just rewards not just work like that but there's a team who moved south of the border to support himself during the big yellow and uh they deserve all the look that they might have had i haven't had that much luck actually they've just been very very good and executed to the nth degree good fight back by team court off after that loose wheel stephen mcnally ends up 12th overall eighth in gtd when it looked quite frankly like it might be dead last for a while in 12th position so a few extra points garnered there for the team that came into this weekend leading gtd jeremy some of their rivals ahead of them i'll let you do that a bit of arithmetic while shear talks to the team matthew campbell we said earlier it felt a lot like glam rock and hey feels a lot like limerock once again uh race winners how does it feel yeah it's quite surreal i mean our fifth win of the season uh crazy result from the whole team but certainly was a really tough race and we pulled it off in strategy running out of fuel on the inland bear so uh crazy race but we got there in the end so couldn't be happier and you know great job by the whole team and more importantly it basically clinches the championship all you need to do is start motul petite mall weight off the shoulders yeah 100 now we can uh have some fun try and do some special things in petite and hopefully get another win and send this current generation car off with uh with the final result congrats thank you so much ran out of fuel on the in lap and in fact it's been pushed down to victory circle now now that that is somebody good on the slide rule for far for the sport so we've heard from the two leading teams let's uh work out what's happening at the two winning teams let's work out what's happening with jeremy shaw in gtd it was team court of jeremy who came into the weekend with a lead their closest contenders with the hartner racing 27 team who really ruled the dice they have ended up with second jan halen and the right motorsports car came alive after that final pit stop and they've ended up with a fifth what does that do to gdt that must be really tight now that it was already tight that gamble has paid off the harder racing team uh 26 30 points by my reckoning to the 25 85 of team caught off in the mercedes 2573 for right motorsports in car number 16 and also you know not too far back windward racing now with the second consecutive win on 24.90 so only 140 points out of the lead so that is absolutely game on going to michelin raceway road atlanta wow it's going to be one of these where we're going to have to do a matrix something we're going to have to do and if then for that because you could see that changing on the uh you could actually see that changing on the final lap we've had that before how close was that manufacturer points to uh bmw's still lead on 29 72 to the 2949 of mercedes 29-13 for aston martin so mercedes they're getting closer and closer still still in well no up into second position now and ahead of aston martin well it's going to take away one to get the fat portion of victory circle because it's not going by porsche flat six power it's gone by faf team power at the moment and that is in some ways absolutely appropriate because that was a full team effort jeremy shaw to get that driveway haggety faff porsche to the win strategy great driving great pit stops everything that was in our porsche keys to the race they pulled it off and that is a worthy victory with no fire in the flat 6 engine it was that close brilliant stuff jeremy yeah it really was that was a tremendous race i think from start to finish fascinating uh there was there was always something interesting going on different strategies all the way through it that was a great motor race jeremy shaw was alongside me john handoff in the hagerty global broadcast center adam was in the pit lane we're gonna hand over the pa here at vir and thanks to everybody appeared dave miller you're a star as ever curriculum connie thank you so much for everything you do for a sport a particular thank you to all of our camera operators and technicians here at the track and further afield charlotte and elsewhere and also to hugh curry and tim over in london who have got our audio to the world we will continue with some more interviews and your questions michelin portrays tech starts right now and we'll be back with live coverage next weekend porsha carrera come from indy and then of course it's motul patilamond last weekend of august beginning of september make sure you join us on imsa radio on imsa tv but for now from vir for our international streaming and global tv audience as well as you on the pa here trackside thanks for joining us enjoy the rest of your weekends posters tech is next

Channel: IMSA Official

Views: 211,776

Keywords: IMSA, International Motor Sports Association, Acura, Aston Martin, Audi, BMW, Cadillac, Chevrolet, Ferrari, Honda, Lamborghini, Mazda, McLaren, Mercedes, Porsche, Lexus, VIR, VIRginia International Raceway

Id: UEahQP9moaQ

Length: 174min 37sec (10477 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 01 2022