RACE 1 - ROAD AMERICA - GT WORLD CHALLENGE AMERICA 2020

[Music] road america in elkhart lake wisconsin is a track that is known for massive speed and consequence and legendary history and respect hi everybody greg creamer along with calvin fish and ryan marine it is time for the first of two races this weekend in the gt world challenge america powered by aws we are set for round seven to unfold here at this absolutely fabulous facility welcome one and all yesterday this place started off a wash in the morning it got better in the afternoon today is nigh into perfect in terms of conditions to go racing and uh uh you know cal we've been seeing some of the shots the iconic corners around this absolutely fabulous facility it's a beaut it's a gem and uh it's probably one of the best in the world it's a magical place greg when you come to elkhart lake you'll see the circuit here four miles in length and gives you a little bit of everything in terms of the challenges some long stretches of high speed where you need you know low downforce ideally but then you've got a lot of cornering and a lot of heavy brake zones where you really make up your lap time particularly in that middle sector sector two it's all about corning all about balance on the race car and that's where the majority of the lap time comes from you're in these corners for a long long time most of them are fast and absolutely right just a fabulous place to go racing and uh in the gt world challenge america powered by aws this year since we came back from the covid pandemic big break the numbers have been down this category uh tends to have a lot of international competitors in it and of course with travel restrictions that's been difficult so the numbers have been a little lower than we certainly expected for the season had things been normal but they produced some great racing and uh one of the classes the silver category has been owned by racer's edge motorsports they've been the only car competing in it they've had great runs to overall success and the like but they've got competition in class for the first time this weekend they do they've been dominant this year six wins on the trot and uh you think can anyone touch them well this weekend we have a new silver combination from winwood racing uh indy donchi put his car on the pole here today the number 33 amg mercedes on the pole sharing that car with young russell ward and they will definitely give that race's edge motor sports group a run for their money here this afternoon the mercedes is very much up to speed there we see the zero four car the crowd strike entry that leads the championship right now greg but only by a single point over the squadron corsa uh uh ferrari uh the number one machine fuentes and rodrigo baptista yeah that's about as close as it gets in that category you messed uh a mention russell ward let's get down to ryan marine down in the pits with that young gentleman yes cindy donche already strapped into the car gives us a chance to speak to russell ward first of all great to have you back second different co-driver for you in the championship and the jump to the silver class what do you expect here in your first weekend of silver class competition yeah you know look uh there's a lot of stiff competition here so you know i really expect to keep it clean it's me and indy's first time uh racing here at road america in a gt3 car we've i've done some racing here in a gt4 and i know indy has never done any racing here before so it's a real tough track to pick up incredibly fast in the mercedes amg gt3 and you know just looking forward to it i'd say he's a quick study he picked it up pretty quick right to stick it on pole absolutely you know that's why he's here i mean the guy's as fast as a jet so it's a pleasure to drive with him that transition from gt4 to gt3 especially with the mercedes platform being common between them how seamless has it been making that step up you know it's been pretty seamless you know the only the real difference between the cars is the aerodynamics and the gt4 doesn't have a lot of aerodynamics whereas the gt3 has you know a thousand pounds of downforce so it's uh it requires just a lot of trust in yourself and trust in the car to be able to you know go through all the fast you know committed corners here at road america without uh you know getting a little nervous so but the boys have set given us a great car nice and consistent easy to drive so we'll see what uh see what we can do awesome to have you back at the championship best of luck this weekend okay thank you yeah and that real quick that gets to something i've had people give me a little bit of grief for saying it this way in the past but aerodynamic downforce i call it false grip because it exceeds the mechanical grip of the car and to really extract that you need to have max confidence and speaking of confidence in cars that dynamic the front end of the pro-am field with that one-point battle between those two cars that have been there for most of the year that might be changing here at road america with uh this number 63 car yeah it's a new chassis i mean they switched the over evo upgrade with just an upgrade package to start this year but ryan dial has not been happy he's been saying i don't understand why the sister car under the dxdt camp has been a little bit quicker will they change share season it's got immediate effect ryan yellen the second round of qualifying that sets up the grid for tomorrow had the fastest laps or certainly paying dividends and uh pulling into perspective the performance of young russell ward yes he'll line up six for tomorrow's race but he was in fact the tenth quicker than indy donchi in his qualifying run so both of those drivers very evenly matched here today and could pull off a bit of a surprise absolutely in a car that's consistently just sought a shot at it playing with overall top threes is that number 20 right motorsports porsche with fred pordad and max root still running in the am category and running their unopposed this weekend uh but they really in that case just kind of turn their attention to overalls yeah i mean they're not intimidated fred poured out has really been a revelation this season in terms of his experience and uh what he's been able to achieve alongside his very young teammate young max route is really going places in this sport just got announced to a le mans lineup for next month's 24-hour race over in france so he's got a lot going on but he put his car forth on the grid here today with just a few tenths of a second off the pole position so look for young max route to make some moves here early yeah very strong indeed and looking for this one and then of course running with these cars these gt3 machines in this race will be the fifth round of the gt sports cup america gt sports club america excuse me they'll be running four cars strong coming out for this and again interesting to see how that has all played out you take a look at it mark isa driving a gt3 ferrari the tr3 entry right there is on the overall pole but not by that much and ryan gates uh showing the speed that we've seen from him all year in the gt2 portion of the all-white 311 rs motorsports machine outside of their front row well gates has the chairmanship lead and he's been the man to meet in this new sports club arena but um don't count out those gt3 machines we talk about road america about the handling about the braking ability will a gt3 car will still outperform that gt2 car through the cornering sections of this racetrack but in terms of straight line speed the gt2 cars up over 175 miles an hour here's about a 15 mile an hour delta between them and the gt3s and they do start behind the gt3 field and we've often wondered they give them a pretty good gap but we've often wondered about with all those horses and it's a big difference on this track if anybody's going to come up and play with them and we'll see how that unfolds but looking forward to this one there is the racer's edge accurate accelerated services nsx gt3 and it's interesting that car has really been strong wherever we've been this year but we're getting reports ryan uh gave us an update uh earlier in the day that that car they've been dealing with a little imbalance in that car yeah and you need balance around this race track so we sure shelby's black stock laid down a lap pretty early in that qualifying session then just let it sit maybe trying to save some tires for the races here this weekend so they're up against a little bit the anchor has always been strong here at a dominant weekend here last year winning pro-am both days and in fact an overall win for real-time racing with mike hetland and dane cameron last year celebrating real-time racing's a 100th victory and will challenge competitions so um we'll have to wait and see what they can come up with here today bit of work to do though absolutely and uh there's a look at mark eason the cockpit of that tr3 nobu hotel and issa law entry this is his first start in the gt sports club category he has raced in the gt3 machinery in gt world challenge america powered by aws a few times last year and earlier this season and for those that might be tuning in for the first time and aren't really familiar with gt world challenge america uh let's talk a little bit about it a little bit different than the gt4 sprint x category that we have in terms of length of race and what happens during the pit stops yes it's a 90 minute event there's a mandatory driver change that has to happen between the 45 and 55 minute marks been bumped up five minutes to account for the checkered flag that will be displayed for the sports club races here today so their checkered flag will come at 40 minutes in so for the gt3 cars four tire change driver change a little bit of fuel going on board to meet the 90 minute race length so a lot go on during that time and it's 81 seconds of the minimum stop time so you've got to be on pit lane at least 81 seconds there's a one-second joker that you can use just once during the course of both events this weekend and a lot of that 81 seconds is taken in the drive into the pit lane it is a long pit entry here isn't it yeah i think it accounts for about 40 odd seconds of just traversing down the pit lane and uh then you've got a lot of work to do there's enough of a buffer there you can execute and should be sitting still for a few seconds but if it goes wrong just a little bit suddenly you're outside of that window and giving up time and potentially track position as well well you bring up the key there if the car drops off the jacks and everything's done and it sits for just a little bit that's the sign everything went well if it drops and goes probably not a great stop they can coincide but typically it means you're leaving a few tenths or seconds on the table that's for sure i just have always loved since tr3 debuted that graphic scheme they uh ran that car in that colors in those colors here uh last year as well and it is glorious did want to mention something here at sonoma in the uh fifth round of the championship when fuentes and baptista got the win in the hublot ferrari that was the 488 gt3's 300th win globally wow great great event for that team to be able to pull it off for squadron corsa nicely done huh yeah absolutely and martin fuentes he always seems to be up at the shop and whichever class he's running in in these championships and he and rodrigo are certainly a formidable pairing for more success here today baptista has been really quick here this weekend in fact led both of the sessions here yesterday in both wet and dry conditions and ultimately he lines up fifth for tomorrow's race so i think that was maybe the biggest prize from this morning's uh qualifying session dial will be on the poll tomorrow and baptista back on the third row so a lot of work to do for the squad of course a team to go and chase down that crowd strike entry for the championship lead absolutely but they do start in front of it for this race fuentes as you said just on form here he loves this play he doesn't obviously but uh just a great run by him qualifying to start on the pro amp pole kurtz will be behind him and then fred poor dad doing uh just another great job and taking that right motorsport porsche up to fifth overall and then david askew in that mercedes amg gt3 machine and yeah i think for david obviously having run the the car that was the platform they ran previously with the evil kit on it making the switch to the full evo package uh you know he's not a top flight pro like dealt might take him just a little bit longer to make the of the adjustment to what the different nuances of that car yeah and you could see that during the qualifying session he was gradually getting up to speed each lap was faster so look for him to uh hang with the pack here and his speeds to increase throughout the course of his stint here today you saw that stu frederick in the gt sports club is running in a class called iron what that's an age-related category and it means you're 60 or older there's another class called titanium we don't have anybody running that today which is 15 to 59 and then there's the overall and that is for any age group and anybody that runs in it and then we separate them out between gt3 and gt4 as well and as we're watching the field out on their installation and formation lab check in with ryan once again in pit lane well our poll sitter in gt sports club mark isa this is his first race back from a pretty nasty testing crash that happened about two months ago at road atlanta he actually showed me the onboard video from that crash just a little while ago and it was eye opening it was at road atlanta a fairly high speed section of the track and he suffered abs failure it sent him into a wall head on at pretty much unabated speed he said he broke several bones in that crash and has been working hard to get back into racing and this weekend he gets to do just that he admitted to me it has been a bit of a mental hurdle to clear here this weekend in road america think about all the high-speed quarters here then you're going to need those brakes to work for you but he's so excited to be back once again and that uh that effervescent personality of his just bubbled over what he was describing to me his level of excitement to be racing once again yeah when he and fuentes were teamed up for a couple of races you you just see the the hauler would vibrate almost with the energy between those two they are such great uh great uh intensity amongst them uh for life as well as as they're racing if those two guys ever throw a party together you want to be there it'd be a lot of fun that's for sure and you could see that by how pumped up mark was after both of his pole position uh runs here this morning so great to see him back great to see him recovered and knocking off the rust and getting back to competition absolutely lights out on the acura nsx the official safety vehicle of the gt world challenge america powered by aws so indy dante is going to be bringing this field around to the green flag and that windward racing mercedes amg gt3 is uh racing in europe in the adac gt3 championship there busy guy uh as uh racing gets back on a uh footing globally here look at uh askew he's kind of got his nose off to the side a little bit and then he tucks back in and waiting for that green flag there it goes dante drops the hammer going right with him is black stock look at fuentes hunting down to the inside side by side there between the two dx dt machines as they get into that bridge there's a little that's touch there for the two cars that hit earlier this season at vir so david leskew pushing things down to the outside meanwhile side by side battle for the lead dodgy on the inside blackstock takes the lead into turn three that was a great aggressive move making a statement by shelby blackstock duncher tucks right back in behind and there unbelievable the two dxdt cars ascii is going to be able to get going it looks like but it's tough to tell just how hard that zero four carve kurt's got into those tires it really is and he's pretty much uh way down into that gravel trap i'm not sure he's gonna be able to restrict himself even if the car is healthy so we may see a full course yellow before we get back around here but shelby blackstock a nice start there really taking it to indie donchi early i wonder if that might not have been a little bit of experience on this track knowing that outside line was you can really float some speed through there dante though looks to the inside late on the brakes realized it wasn't going to work and dipped out of it again but showing he's ready to uh go play with these guys blackstock is uh trying to make a bit of a statement here he may have not been happy by losing that poor position here this morning by nearly half a second so takes the acura nsx to the front there's the sweep out of the carousel and now heading into the kink huge commitment [Music] and look at fred porter just hanging with these guys right at the sharp end of things he has been impressive super impressive and ryan gates has got a round mark issa for the lead in the sports club class the question is uh here's your full course yellow kurtz has gone out of the gravel trap but imagine not as we go full course yellow here and that's a shame because uh both of those cars really shown tremendous pace here this weekend the dxdt team were testing here last month let's take another look at it he's on the flank of george kurtz they get down towards the brake zone just not enough room there a little glancing blow looks like curse is going to get away when david's out of control he tags the back end of this crowd strike mercedes and turns him as well i don't think george realized that david was there at all no you're looking towards the corner you've got competitors in front of you you may have a spotter who's giving you the word you've got someone to your left side but just a little bit too much aggression there i feel by david on the opening corner of the lab he had a run going you said he kind of picked his headlights out early to take a look well and i think my guess is that george's uh eyeballs were in that that mirror on his right looking at fuentes but it just didn't have a clue looked at from both angles there that george card really didn't move that much as david now hits pit lane as we said before this is a brand new race car so he'll take in and the crew will do a quick ricky here and see if there's any damage to it here's that long pit entry that we're talking about and there is a mandatory pit speed limit there and you're just in that pit speed limiter forever it feels like here again getting this car out of the gravel is one thing and then we'll have to see just what kind of damage was done to the back i don't think there was much damage done in that that little side hit he's just trying to feel a car out as well see any major damage to the car but they'll take this opportunity to check everything out well this is smart with that full course caution and you'll be able to catch back up but it's not like he's going to be really deep in the field so this makes sense a little bit of damage there on that right front or the left front from the driver's perspective we'll take a look at that momentarily but splitter looks solid it does big concern that's huge all right george's cars probably got some tail damage i'm guessing let's get down to ryan and hear what's happening with the 63. the crew is obviously giving this a very close look over they've been shaking the wheels to make sure that the suspension is okay the big concern right now is to get him out before he loses a lap a lot of eyes on where the safety car is at the moment he's down off the jacks and about to send them out initial reaction from the crew member guys was that everything was okay but they wanted to give it a second and third look just to make sure i wouldn't be terribly surprised if we saw them come back in once they get back up to speed and make sure that they stay in front of the pace car and keep on the leader lap yeah i think it's very smart move and at this track we talked about in the open it's so high speed and such high consequence that if you've got any concerns about the car you're going to give it a good look over and let's give this one more look over it's just it wasn't much of a drift yeah it's a little bit bumpy there's as you get towards that brake zone looks like uh david's car just bobbled a little bit to the right just enough to set that glancing blow off to uh george's car the uc ramps into the tires just watch right there just a brush and then there was that contact luckily no one else involved there as the field tries to get through term one cleanly so i think uh it's gonna be interesting to see when the o4 comes in just to see how bad that damage is at the back we're going back to green though lights are out so that was a great call by the dxd crew with the 63 looking it over thoroughly but making sure that he didn't go down a lot but he i think he's well behind on this lap business and i think for george curtis he was hoping there was another lap of yellow for enabling him to get back around so uh he's got damage to the race cause he's probably going to have to visit pit lane and david askew is trying to catch up to this pack as well now we'll find out if injury dangchy is a a quick study and if he can return the favor to shelby but look at shelby boy he's done these restarts here before he knows the game immediately opened up a margin four different manufacturers at the front of this field right now acura leads mercedes leads ferrari leads porsche that ryan gates was thinking about coming up making a move to the inside of red board we've got 700 horsepower to play with there if he gets out of turn three here well this could be interesting white 311 rs motorsports entry jason bell there running in eight different races here this weekend runs in the second position right now in the sports club field number two gmg porsche blackstock big lead here in this opening half lap gates being pretty gentlemanly there he had a huge run i think he could have easily gone by poor dad but he understands as well that guys up in front of him are fighting for season championship as well this eventually this is where they should ease away a bit yeah and this middle sector is all about handling and that's where the gt3 cars have a massive advantage with the downforce that they develop over the gt2 cars so black stock really good restart here gaps indy immediately is everyone starting to settle in here's gates and this is the stick of these gt3 machines is going to make a difference you can see he's falling back just a little bit he's doing a nice job though really is he's hanging with them and there'll be a big speed difference down these uh fast sections by about 15 miles an hour now kurtz makes his way back into pit lane quite a bit of damage there as he went into the tie bundle pretty hard there with the rear end defuser is uh broken up a little bit this is the championship leader remember so they got to do everything they can to get him back out there at least occur some points here today and try and regroup for tomorrow the speeds you run here and the importance of that downforce there just got to be very very careful as the loads put on those uh aerodynamic those veins on those diffusers and the like is huge [Music] it certainly is i'm gonna be curious to see how indie donkey does here you'll learn a lot here from following shelby doesn't have a ton of track time obviously first time here this weekend so he should be getting quicker and quicker as he gets more laps under his belt for martine fuentes right now you wonder what his his mo is at this stage uh because both the zero four was the guy that they've been battling with in the championship in the 63. he was third but a ways back in the championship um are way way back at this stage and is he just going to really take care of the tires let these two silver guys go and play i think he should i mean he's very smart he knows how to win championships so he'll be delivered that message by the radio from his team to say yeah listen the all fours on pit lane 63 is way back there just settle in hit your marks don't get too racy here let's just try and score as many points as we can all right looks like they are thinking about getting this car out all that uh high-speed tape on the cars it's amazing how well it does hold and here we go kurtz is out remember those two teammates got together at vir right before a pit stop the early race there earlier this summer stu frederick taking a look down the inside of jason bell going into the carousel he's talking about teammates hitting each other his two teammates in close proximity for gmg yeah bell driving for that equip and so is frederick again frederick in the iron class here's a look at jason now he's dropped from the pole towards the back end of this field right now so he's got to regroup here he's got more lap time but probably frustrated by how he gets gap down these long straightaways that's the dynamic between the gt2 and the gt3 car i was actually going to ask you about that on this track if one of these gt2 cars got in front of it could be difficult for him to pass well it's been difficult enough that the other two have gone by him as well yes because he's just going to get stretched considerably probably by that half a dozen carvings down this long front straight away and then he gets to turn one will have more apex rolling speed but he's too far back to do anything with it just see that margin build [Music] then you get between these fast fast corners and i mentioned it earlier today the qualifying but you look at this track and you think about all of the legendary corners around here but turn one is wickedly quick it really is and you have to commit this track limits that will be enforced here on the exit there in terms of using too much of the curbage on the outside but even so there's a lot to be had there just by committing and maximizing that radius through that corner see how he keeps getting stretched here down the straightaways is uh we now focus in on indy dodge he's closed in a little bit on shelby blackstock and i expected to see this where indy should be getting stronger as this race moves forward just learning more about the track and then you follow somebody who has a lot of track experience you can pick up little clues from them as well this is not an easy race track it's a long track so even if you have a one hour practice session you're not getting a lot of laps by the time you share with your teammates so you come here for the first time it's a steep learning curve you don't want to make a mistake here as you said greg it's a high consequence racetrack it's old school not a lot of runoff for him currently crouch strike fastest lap goes to indy donchi two minute nine point six nine two is a good one here is he's taking that margin down to just about half a second three times quicker than shelby on that previous lap so i used to see shelby just kind of dominate the early proceedings of race one and driving away from the field trying to build a good buffer for his teammate trent hitman as we suspected he's going to have a tough road here today with this silver entry from wynwood racing and trent has just been remarkable this year every year we've seen this now there's that speed he can roll through the corners and then that uh porsche tail gets smaller and smaller yeah we continue to see that overflow coming out towards the tail end of the diffuser when we first saw it this morning we thought it was around the right rear tire which is not ideal but my space to be coming out and spraying out the back we see it consistently around this race circuit [Music] a little bit closer now so marquise is starting to get into a rhythm he's closed in on frederick and he's going to lose a bit of time here but then he's going to get into that middle sector and maybe down in a turn eight or something a little bit further around this lap he can start to uh think about making a move and cutting through the field a little bit this next sector next three or four corners he should be a lot quicker than these gt2 machines as he runs a little bit more himself yeah he's really starting to try and flow that speed to the corners to get to the scenario here where he can do something with somebody there that is again [Music] drop down into turn eight he's just a bit too far back so he's got to rethink this and go through the chess match one more time the issue is he can get some really serious speed built up here through the carousel carry it through the kink but then after the king there's still a fairly good run where it's flat chat down in a can of corner although we have seen some guys that pin that a little bit too close to the left in these gt2 cars with all that power it really affects their entry into canada doesn't it it certainly does and there you see the difference between the gt2 machines 173 miles an hour and the speed trap versus high 150s to 161 is the quickest time right now but the 93 car 12 to 15 miles an hour has been a consistent delta between the two classes here this weekend [Music] shelby has stretched that margin up to three quarters of a second on uh donche fuentes five seconds back and i think he's managing things and poor dad is within uh a second and a half of fuentes right now he's hanging right there with the squadron course of ferrari so fred poordad continuing to impress no one near the experience of martinez so for him to be able to hang on like this on a very difficult race circus really a testimony to the fred and the whole team right motorsports a lot of uh experience there led by john wright of course and young max root has been sensational this year really put in some solid performances see shelby there was attraction just a little bit looked like tc had to save him a little bit as he exited turn five so big question mark is gonna be time management scope he's got to make sure that he's uh keeps some tyres underneath him he's got a long stint ahead of him that pissed off window opens up a little bit later been a change since the start of the year it used to be between the 40 and 50 minute mark now it's been bumped up to the 45 to 55 minute mark to allow us to check and flag the sports club races first the interesting thing ryan gave us an update during that qualifying session about how that team racer's edge they felt after a few laps they'd get this little imbalance in the car and uh were they able to solve that a bit and give him a car that's going to stay consistent or is he starting to feel that imbalance come in at this stage as we watch mr gates and he has been impressive this year yeah he's been unbeaten this year so uh certainly the class of the field so far and uh does a really nice clean job we see him in qualifying he just lays down one lap takes a cool down lap rethinks it and then goes at it again so a nice approach this is where it's really difficult in those gt2 cars you really have to set up this left hand kink here and get more into a straight line breaking zone see easter they're looking to the inside more down force he can break a little bit later than frederick in front of him i think for he is he almost has to get the pass done going into five because then he can use the extra grip of that car to give enough of a margin to protect him down into canada corner the issue he's going to have of course is staying with a car that's 50 miles an hour faster in a straight line close to 5. yeah i think the key is to be as close as he could be down in the fight who needs to be really tight through turn three minimize the damage and the gap down towards the brakes over turn five and that next sector he's got a really hanged up and maybe make a move into turn eight i feel is his best opportunity that's a really good point that would probably be a better shot at it here as we take a look at recovering david askew and right now and see what the margin is back to dave he's a minute behind his field they got him out before he lost a lap but he was still way around the back side of a four mile circuit so for these guys to come back into play here and do for ryan d all to have a shot at doing something they need a caution they do they need a reset they need to get that lucky caution for them and bring this back back together george kurtz out there just trying to get a feel for this race car really felt frustrated at sonoma raceway they had a drive-through penalty for a supposed pit lane speed violation he took the data to the series and felt that it was not legit and basically had a time penalty taken away from them that promoted them back up to the second position in the points and has given them a one-point lead so they felt they could have won that day without that little delay so a little bit of frustration coming into this one but now very much damage control and he just turned on his previous lap at 211-1 so he's apparently feeling that fairly confident in what that car can do mechanically right now he said couldn't get it done into eight he's so close here you can see frederick defending a little bit yeah it's gonna have to be a big lunge down the inside and frederick's doing a really good job he's got a lot of experience greg ram with the world challenge championship back in 08 and 09 with vipers and uh but just really this is like a bucket list a 60th birthday present to himself in terms of purchasing this gt2 car and going racing with gmg racing as isa gets the run off for turn 14 but he's going to get out drag big time here up the hill but he's getting ever closer everywhere at some point [Music] the fact that it's a 60th birthday present for uh frederick that means that's the reason he's running in the iron category but he also is somebody who's as you can see not too far off in terms of overall and is continuing to hang right with jason bell frederick uh he looked really good in qualifying this morning there was only really about a second separating the gt2 runners in the sports club entry and he's hanging tough with his teammate just up ahead of him keeping him in his sights and not being too distracted by mike issa's presence right behind and him in the four previous races has never been outside of the top three overall a lot of seconds in class a bit of debris there as you exit the carousel drives you have to be aware that i don't want to run over anything with that left front as you enter this high speed kink watching him feed through and watching shelby as he comes whistling down into canada corner what's the word from racer's edge well you were wondering about that imbalance that they were dealing with earlier in the weekend and certainly in qualifying this morning and speaking with the team it was a case of after that first qualifying session they had a pretty good idea of what it would take to fix that problem but because of the rules they could not really enact those changes in between the sessions they couldn't do the kind of changes per the rules that they would have liked to have done so they went back to the setup pad after the qualifying and really tweaked on that car and based on what shelby has been saying to the team over the radio to this point he seems quite happy and it looks like the pace on track would bear that out one other interesting note while talking to trent hitman was where these cars make their speed really does vary over the course of a long lap here at road america he said he feels like it's sector two where the acura really struggles relative to the others it's very good in sectors one and three he thinks the mercedes is strongest in sector two while the ferrari is pretty balanced across the entire lap so really interesting to see that play out oftentimes the ultimate speed is pretty similar across the board but the way that the cars go about achieving that speed can vary greatly well that's pretty interesting but that's all part of that homologation process for a gt3 car with the fia isn't it when you do your evo package or your new manufacturer coming in you make a decision and you go okay we're going to go a little heavier and down for us because we think that's what we need others might say yeah we're going to go lighter on the downforce we want to be quick in a straight line you're locked into that once you make that decision until the next evo period comes but that you know you think with cars that are supposedly gt3 identical you're really not no and uh you know when you talk about the middle sector that's the one win right now where tren believes the mercedes is a little bit stronger as you exit the king you then get into that sector three where he feels that the acura is a little bit stronger probably through its uh straight away speed and we'll watch for the gap here of fuentes here he comes martin fuentes in the squadron corsa entry the hublot ferrari fort lauderdale and concourse club support on that car and then behind him is fred poor dad continues to impress martin you see it really bob around there under the brakes into turn 12 canada corner that would be really on you too it's very easy to lose the rear end late in the tire run on the exit there then the billy mitchell corner used to be a big bridge that went over there they took away in that nice tunnel with the renovations to this track facility but with the bridge was there it's really hard to see the inside of that corner you didn't have the sight line an open picture that you have now it's still a little bit blind isn't it they didn't change the profile of the corner they left the hillside yeah it just feels more open and on the other side of the coin it's just a little less intimidating because that bridge right there was always got your attention too it really did well i'll tell you issa's pace here is forcing frederick up to bell yeah the key is going to be if mark can uh display the discipline and patience here with the frustration factor of running against these much faster gt2 cars keep getting close and uh makes me wonder if he's gonna have a big lunge somewhere [Music] gates has opened things up to the margin of 12.9 seconds now over jason bell gets his chest flying as he does and i think gates finds this a really fascinating challenge with all of his uh time attack stuff watching his qualifying sessions where he puts in a flyer and you watch him prep for turn at turn 14 to start a flyer completes the lap cools off then gets another one going i think he's relishing the challenge now okay i gotta now i've got to string them together and just drive the lap all the time and uh he's figuring it out and there's one thing i watch him in qualifying i wish he'd do a little bit more of that because he seems to do one lap call it down go again maybe that's just how he's built in terms of how he can amass his speed but i really feel as he starts to learn more and more of the road racing craft if he could just click laps together typically you learn from your previous lap you're able to take your brake zone in a little bit deep you're allowed to get allows you to get on the power a little bit sooner because you're comfortable what the car is giving you so i think if he did more consistent long runs in qualifying he could actually run a slightly faster pace i think the tr3 team needs to get on the radio tomorrow is really close got a huge run through the carousel that time looks to the inside frederick protects it's a sketchy place to think about a move particularly with the car that's gonna out accelerate you frederick had to get off the power a little bit there through the king east is closer than he's nev ever been down into the brake zone he may try and make a move here that down force helps breaking immensely and frederick knows that and you can see there slightly shallower approach to these corners for the gt2 cars that's where it gets really tight as that car comes back across to set up for the billy mitchell corner there sometimes if there's an overlap there can be contact lisa gets through 14 just look at him run up the inside he gets the nose is almost equal on occasion and then the horsepower kicks in what i was going to say with his have been watching it in both five and in the 3rd i think if the team gets on the radio and say don't try and roll as much speed through five and eight as you're doing because it's really hurting him on the exit he just he turns in early he's got a lot of speed and he loses it all on the exit and if you can get through five really clean and roll speed through there but a little bit more controlled then he might have the chance to do something up into six or even down at eight as you said yeah it's just really really difficult shelby blackstock because uh as ryan alluded to maybe they've tweaked on that race's edge machine and found a little bit more pace i really thought that you knew darcy with the fastest lap in qualifying and potentially learning from shelby would may be able to uh close in and make some moves here as the time is winding down another 18 minutes until the pit window will open here [Music] that racer's edge team second year only running gt3 equipment and uh you think they've been doing it for decades they have really done a superb job and when they do find a moment when things aren't quite right or whatever they get that change done very effectively and in a hurry it's been a wonderful transition for john muraki and the whole race's age group it's a big move from gts gt4 machinery up to this gt3 platform but they took to it like a duck to water and had immediate success with carl marcelli and martin barkey this is through if he did it down in the tournament i really thought that was the best sequence of corners to maybe get a move down but getting back to the race's edge situation yeah they're a top team and it's really been a great platform for them to uh make a big statement at this level of competition it's been impressive you can see now once he got through in frederick you can see the outright pace of the gt3 car and he's just run down bell in no time and i think he'll put that in the memory bank for tomorrow he recognizes he's got a much better initial start to these races not fall so far back otherwise he's going to have this frustration uh once again you're right frederick missed it a little bit just got in there a bit too hot just runs out wide and mark slides through [Music] on a little bum we actually had their replay because i was going to say they did what i suggested turned five and it paid off in eight but hounding frederick like that just staying in his mirrors and you see stu was definitely defending on him he wanted to keep that overall position and it finally paid some dividends here now he's got to do it all again with the different livery but same car in the hands of jason bell you can see that stretch a little bit tidier from mark down through turn five he's been leaving his break a little bit too late just washing out wide and i think that had really hurt his ability to set up these gt2 cars maybe another brake zone for turner he's a little bit closer to jason bell this time just needs to really focus on getting good speed through here turn seven use the down force here he should be able to break a lot later than jason bell down to the inside jason sees him and he's through nicely done by both drivers and that really all started by his better execution of turn five and he made it pay beautifully and now it's gonna have uh i think some serious work to do to catch flying ryan gates yeah a long way down the road [Music] 1.7 last time by yeah i mean there the difference was only 400 of a second in terms of their lap time last go-around so they're very evenly matched but it was dunchie's personal best so he just continues to be quicker for almost every lap it seems then the strategy comes into play which end of that pissed off window do you want to play with seems like you might see blackstock pit a little bit earlier than indy donchi potentially yes the one risk you have by staying out is if there is a yellow suddenly you're going to be slow if someone's already made that pissed off you typically going to cycle back a little bit further in the field so don't want to get too clever here the last couple of laps we've been following shelby back into that actor is looking pretty happy it's moving around and uh he's driving it incredibly quickly but it could mean that [Music] he's a very determined young man i really uh admired his way through the sport did some gt racing early then went to indy lights and really felt that this should be his home for his career so we switched back here found a great group he's been doing some tcr racing this year as well so he's getting a lot of seat time and i think this platform is great for the team the tutelage that he gets there a really phenomenal teammate exactly yeah well i think so i think just the way that uh john muraki runs that program uh can be confidence-inspiring [Music] between them each lap very consistent they've both found their sweet spot and gap in the rest of this field by a solid second plus per lap so it's going to put their teammates in really good shape certainly for others in this field guys like colin brown and ryan diel they're certainly hoping for some help with a a caution flag even though the kurtz car is now a couple of laps down with the repairs they had to affect but uh certainly for ryan deal he's got a fast car he's sean pace here this weekend evidenced by his pole position time for tomorrow's race but a long way back [Music] just looking at the scoring here david askew he is closing on the frederick bell group to the tune of three or four seconds a lap so he might catch them before this pit window opens [Music] fall into the carousel here road falls away from you just as you want and grip and help as you start to increase the speed he's taking more and more away from you and then it gives you plenty of time to think about the confidence factor heading into the king so many just high commitment corners here it's just a treasure of a racetrack i mean every corner has its own unique challenges lots of unjubilation off camber blind corners big brake zones what do you do with the setup where do you compromise to get around this racetrack and what's the best for race ability [Music] that bump on the approach to 14 is looks like it's a little bit more uh pronounced pronounced than last year yeah it's a big one it's right here heavily on the brakes of the cars completely depressed down on the road and suddenly you hit that big bump just gets into a timing thing you you get into the rhythm of that it just unsettles the car right before you're turning in but if you try and chase the corner a little bit harder on entry you're going to miss it that was a near moment by gates [Music] that was that exit to that billy mitchell corner and you get it the angle wrong on that just a little bit and he is pushing for everything it's worth this is about as tight as we've seen between the gt3 cars and gt2 cars this year bearing in mind this is a four mile racetrack and gate's fastest lap is only about three seconds off the fastest gt3 times of the weekend so that's much tighter than we've seen so far this year and i would think that would be due to the three very long straights at this track where that horsepower will make a difference let's see isa is 13 seconds behind him and lapping about a second quicker but he doesn't have a lot of time here time has run that rapidly here only uh four more minutes on the board before the sports club class will get their checkered flag five minutes later the pissed off window will open up for the gt3 machines [Music] a little bit of understeer push dialed into the car every time you see the cars got a lot of steering input and the front wheels are doing a lot of work on the exit the corners but that's probably not a bad way to go when you got this much horsepower underneath you trying to tame 700 horses around this race circuit little drift there we saw that in qualifying this morning a couple of times yeah there's that push you're talking about yeah i think he's getting more and more confident with this uh this race car weekend by weekend i think he's taking it pretty tentatively initially when we saw him this season greg at vir when we had the opening rounds of this championship yeah not here he is definitely as you said i think that comfort factor knowing the car a little bit better and i have a feeling for a guy who you know with the time attack and just that high speed approach of just flogging i think relish is doing it on a track like road america you can see he really sets up that entry to canada corner very well by his line through that king that we're looking at right there for mark issa just getting from point a to point b so much quicker with the gt2 cars you've got to be thinking way ahead [Music] 175 miles an hour you crest the hill and get on the brakes for term one long corner you really need to get right down to that apex there seems to be a lot more grip there and plunge down the hill trying to make a straight line oh frederick on bell two gmg porsches going at it and just not enough room there looks like that was up in the turn six well sonoma remember frederick and kyle washington both for this had a little bit of contact there and i think frederick that time he didn't want to be part of contact at the second straight event and uh he got out of the break we're out of the throttle uh so he didn't get into him and that's what got that weight transfer and had that spin happen here but that's now brought george uh or excuse me david ask you right on to his six you're gonna have to wait and see if david gets frustrated by that gt2 car's straightaway speed like marquissa has been dealing with as we said these cars are going to be checking flag here momentarily lap and a half for our leader right now i think before he'll see that checkered flag and then gt3 cars can start thinking about their pissed off window see the understeen just see a lot of steering angle in those front wheels you're talking about you know is is ask you going to deal with that uh speed differential like issa did and i was gonna say i think isis showed really great discipline and patience in that battle yeah uh he's enjoying it and he recognizes that he's gonna be fighting that dynamic particularly after the first lap he had so here's jason bell as we said very busy man running eight races this weekend and uh just showing remarkable poise and discipline to be able to jump between a gt4 car that he's running in two different uh races each day and then jumping aboard this much higher horsepower basically going from like 400 to 700 horsepower literally in a blink of an eye i think this morning out of the spring race pit lane and jumped on board to qualify this car it should be the last lap for ryan gates in the gt sports club america field [Music] the margin between the two of them about 11 seconds yeah he's just got to figure out a way to be able to uh be a lot closer earlier so we can get to the front yeah he fell a long way back on the opening lap so again he's returning from a big incident as ryan alluded to so uh just taking things easy and that's really the whole concept of this sports club class is uh for these drivers to come here enjoy the environment enjoy some brilliant racetracks that we visit with the sro championships and uh just not be quite so intense about the racing just enjoy the experience i think yeah i think that's absolutely it you know surely it's a competition and they want to go out and show well but it's more about the fun factor to be able to go out and drive these amazing machines as you said on a venue like this and were it not for the coveted pandemic protocols and the like normally there would be a big hospitality area set up for the driver and their families and that's all that's the sports club concept and i'll tell you gates he has no issue just using up every piece of racetrack he was almost up and over that apex curb there and washed him out a little bit wider than he normally is for the exit but um putting on a show he really has figured out their run from the kink into canada with all this horsepower and how to straight line that breaking he's doing a nice job last time up through billy mitchell now heading into turn 14 and continuing to sweep everything in the gt2 overall category up the hill for 311 rs motorsports and porsche ryan gates adds yet another win to what has been a superb season here comes mark isa who showed great patience in the gt3 tr3 nobu who tiles entry brings home the gt3 win just a nice job here's jason bell this guy he said nothing but top three overalls he's going to keep that streak intact and lots of second places in class the only gates jason going to keep that run going again in the gmg racing machine waiting for one of these guys to ignore the checkered flag and having so much fun they just stay out there stay out there until they run out of fuel exactly and here comes stu frederick who will finish fourth overall and win the iron category in his gmg racing gt2 porsche he had a really good run though his lap times were good he held off marquissa for the longest time and then uh had a bit of an attack on his teammate jason bell for the position turn six didn't quite pull it off and getting out of it abruptly is why he dropped back like that and you can see now black stock last few laps he's been able to uh open the margin up over indy don't you to almost three seconds cal yeah really consistent just laid down another lap in the 208 range just a tenth of a second off his best so really consistent run here for shelby and right at that critical point if they are thinking about making that early pit stop he's uh really brought the car in a great position for his teammate trent hitman and a fair margin from dante back to fuentes but right now martine is less than a second in hand over fred mordad so there it is boy fred is doing just a brilliant job and again martine understands nobody around him in his class he's got this well in hand the last thing you want to do is push unnecessarily and have something happen but still for uh fred poor dad who is a true am driver he's got to be grinning knowing that he's glued to the back of a driver like fuentes yeah really a nice performance by fred here and uh what this could set up for is a really nice little battle between baptista and uh they have equal pit stops and we see this sort of margin this could be sensational watching those two [Music] that youngsters keeping the heat on he wants to uh maybe grab that track position before we see uh everyone start to hit pit lane well and the squadron corsa guys they get it they're awfully good at what they do and i i wonder if part of their their ideology their thought process right now is look just go fast enough nobody around you is threatening you if we get a caution and suddenly that brings the likes of uh ask you and kurtz back up to you you'll still have some tire left in that ferrari and then you can go ahead and defend and drive away from them for sure they've got to be thinking that that long term don't you you do there's an opportunity here because the pit window is open as you can see and the leaders have already passed pit in so it may give the opportunity for one of these two cars to make the early stop then if you got yellow they'd be in great shape compared to the overall leaders so a lot of what if's going on with that scenario but certainly if uh wright motorsport brings in fred poordart if you don't i think that they want to get max route and baptista behind the wheel of the scuderia corsa car as well as early as possible as you see them hit pit lane you called it just the vagrance of the rules there yeah it doesn't have to at one time it had to be the leaders have the first opportunity they did away with that a couple of seasons ago so now as soon as the clock hits that pit window open mark anyone can jump in now it's all about execution here i'm hoping that both these teams execute at a similar level so we can see baptista versus root yeah that should be the second half of this race that'll be really cool got the clock going here so we'll keep an eye on it rodrigo busy boy this year two different championships running in the sro endurance championship with the k-packs root in baptista [Music] looks pretty smooth so far this really does it's the kurtz has come in as well as we said the telltale is is the card down and sits for a minute like that that's a good sign going over to le mans in about a month's time that's awesome boy problem for the hublot ferrari they dropped and went yeah they're definitely gonna lose some margin here it wasn't a great one even by right motorsports they're five seconds outside of the window so a disaster here for rodrigo baptista 11 seconds outside the minimum pit stop delta time seemed to me like the tires were really late getting out there i thought driver change was going on refueling it's not like you have to do one before the other everything can be done at the same time i wonder if they missed time these because those tires now you're allowed to have them in tire warmers and on a cool day like this they certainly would have been maybe they just didn't get them to the pit wall in time that's possible all right here we go now d'all getting on board as david askew climbs out with that law with that longish stop this is opportunity here for that 63. it is they're a long way behind they still need a reset with the caution right that's been resolved everything now moving pretty smoothly all things considered for the racers edge team fresh pirelli p0s going on to the left side of the car now the crew coming around to the right which is a well coordinated well orchestrated ballet for this pit crew no question about that left rear on a little trouble getting the air hose release now the car is dropping towards the front of the car now they released trent because they held him i don't think it cost him too much but boy that was chaos there at the end of that stop yeah a long one as well this 81 seconds is proving to be a challenge wow everyone really struggling with this i'm not sure if the uh the math was a little bit off in terms of how long it should take to get these uh stops done here today but no one even close to it no i mean the six seconds over everybody the closest one was what five seconds long by poor dad to root i actually quite like it because it puts it all in the hands of the crew to execute them you're not just sitting around waiting waiting and having a sandwich you're gonna make it happen well i mean this is the pinnacle of support of the sport right the gt3 category the gt world challenge and uh so it's a team sport the team should feel some of the pressures as well and have to execute like the drivers do and uh i i think it makes it a great show well if they can execute closer to that delta it could easily give russell ward the track position over trent hinman because uh the black star treatment trent hitman uh exchange was six seconds outside of the minimum stop time all right well now chen hinman's gonna put his head down and get after it here and he'll know i would imagine that the team will tell them listen we lost some time on pit lane you got to get your hammer down otherwise we're going to lose track position here to the windward racing machine russell ward going to jump on board been a really busy boy since everyone's got back to racing running in a number of championships with great speed and effect indy did a nice job on his first visit to road america here he's running in european events as well teamed up with hpp bryce ward russell's dad is uh into that oh partnership haven't been picking the throttle up early there 14 didn't he really carrying some speed well this is going to potentially be a really good stop here if everything goes well because they had the ability to wait here there goes hinman [Music] i just don't get what's going on here today because they held and waited yes not even close to it i mean if they had executed there and gone it could have potentially jumped the 93 car and uh they just did a pit stop time which is uh 13 seconds outside of the minimum let's see with those uh preheated tires see what russell can get after it here i think that is now colin brown i'm down a couple laps obviously yes but to see how all of this cycles through at this stage both dxdt cars were testing here last month so uh you'd expect them to have good pace here this weekend [Music] only trent hitman looks to be in great shape here yes he does he is just an immense talent and uh just a great fit with this team [Music] basically uh driver on the hpd books honda performance development so great to see him busy coming off a gt3 championship last year again this full-time ride in sro competition as well all of these drivers at this stage of their career want to be as busy as they can he is after it [Music] didn't get the message yet that they had a better see what this lap is here best set so far 208 3 by colin brown but what does hinman do but a 208 one fast lap of the race yeah he's just really confident in this car now there's a ton of miles knows the car really well and i think this car is a lot better suited to this new pirelli tire this year as well seems to be a much bigger sweet spot much bigger range to uh get the car working than the accurate last year even though real time had a lot of success seven wins on the year i believe so um but it seemed like the car was a little bit quirky last year to really get into that setup window well they're running that new tire in this uh series this year and to a person pretty much everybody has said that they like the new tire they said it's not necessarily quicker like in a qualifying two lap run but they said over a stint it just seems to uh perform better and you're faster at the end of the stint than you were with the previous tire so that's what you want from a tire really delivering just with that pit up pit stop exchange we saw indy donchi basically about two to three seconds back i think it was that uh when they started to make their pit stops russell ward is now 16 seconds behind so uh just that time spent on pit lane has uh really hurt them yes i just think that that minimum pit stop delta is maybe not achievable and then if you have a bad one on top of that it really gets quite alarming when you look at the numbers [Music] max root sitting in the third spot but a ways back yeah that's a shame that the squadron corsa team had such a poor stop as well because it really took the sting out of that potential battle i was really looking forward to seeing uh young max and rodrigo baptiste to go hard at it and the talking about ryan diol who now is in the number 63 dxdt machine and he's running some really quick laps already cal but as you pointed out he's over a minute behind baptiste at this stage because of that problem at the start and pit window is closed but everybody is well in in dealing with it and russell ward hustles the windward racing mercedes machine up the hill road america [Music] again it just really showcases that these silver pairings are awfully tough to beat when you go up against the pro-am uh combinations here this year certainly uh blackstock and hitman have kind of had things their own way most of the time unless they've had a few issues in a race and uh the fact that the first time we've seen another silver silver pairing they're running in the second position today as [Music] just kind of well an eye on lap times here and uh max root has run a uh 208 four compared to hitman's 208 ones that gives you an idea of the speed he's seeing right now [Music] females running in the high 208 range so don't wait and see uh there might be a little bit of damage still to that 63 car because the hours really quick here this morning we'll keep an eye on that and we watched what was just a great performance by ryan gates at the gt sports club america fifth round let's hear from him with ryan a special race i'm sure for ryan gates back in victory lane here and a beautiful setting for it in road america how did you snag the lead and then how did you hold on well that porsche 911 gt2 rs has so much power on the straights um i kind of set it up excuse me set it up prior to um with a quick exit on i think turn to turn three just pinned it follow the ferrari and then fake to the right bomb to the left and that was it thankfully he raced clean too yeah nice race indeed now usually i'm the one asking questions but i understand you've got a question to ask god thank you christina i've got a question for you you don't need a mask krista you are the love of my life and i am wondering if you will please take my name mary will you marry me [Music] special moment here in victory lane in road america guys road america is a magical place how cool is that wow she was thinking he was gonna say did you clean my golf club oh that's just incredible boy cool after a drive like that and then a moment like that this is a we get to remember for man gates family wow pretty special congrats yep pretty special performance here 207 9 by hinn mikel on that last lap yeah that's nice he's uh showcasing oh this is uh unscheduled pit lane infringement there we go just looking at that up on the scoring now it was a slow stop and something wouldn't miss it at the same time so this is gonna really hurt them don't think it's gonna drop them back into the clutches of dial but possibly well and i wonder let's go be getting closer deals just coming through turn 13 right now so uh enough of a gap fortunately for the squad to corsa team there was definitely something going on because those tires got incredibly late well and i almost wondered just from a look that i had at it there's that mandatory grounding clip that has to be attached to the car because of the fueling and i think that has to be pulled either before the car drops to the ground or certainly before it leaves and i wonder if maybe the car moved before they grabbed that clip because it looked like that was pulled really late but that's just pure speculation on my part yeah but nonetheless suddenly now baptista is going to have to be a little bit more mindful of what's unfolding behind him here and if there's a caution oh boy [Music] he threw that 207 9 down now he's back into the 208 2 range and impressed by russell warren running within two tenths i'm really impressed with russell i've been watching this year in different championships and uh just really is gaining a lot of confidence and uh even teamed up with some really good young talent like indie donchi i mean he's running laps a lot quicker than indy was running earlier in this race that's very very impressive [Music] yeah with indy having a full race under his belt and knowledge of this track and russell running the way he is yeah that's a really good point right now trent henry's just gonna enjoy the ride because he's got a really fast race car underneath him perfect track conditions and one of the best circuits in the world i believe let alone north america to be driving a gt3 machine on so no pressure from behind just all about just executing and delivering well in ways i mean this is the type of track that really suits the gt3 car with these long fast corners uh where you want that extra downforce and you can just flow so much speed and that just makes these corners even more intoxicating doesn't it it does the sound of that porsche whistling through the trees here down the back stretch just magical [Music] that engine note hasn't changed in years and you hear that you know that there's a special race going on that's for sure watch the bumps here on the approach to 14. he's got a line through there knockout at all yeah i'd say the car is really working well there in terms of the shock package as well it wasn't as i said it wasn't as big a launch as some of the other cars as you went to turn in [Music] 2087 he's 12 seconds of drift award and that lap was about three seconds or three tenths quicker so like from young max has uh certainly he's got pace but he's not thrown off the road either and uh he hung on the geron when he's one of the most experienced drivers and drives porsches all of the time this year because he's trying to put himself in position for the porsche cup championship which is a global championship scored on points that you can accrue and all of the champions put together globally and uh he just kept blinking right very there's to what daniel morad did a few years ago 2017 uh when he did the same thing mercedes vs mercedes was jerome behind the wheel in that case he held them off and won at net was a he i later admitted he said yep that changed out a lot of people and everything and you you know it's one of the things you get a driver of the global all-world caliber of oblique and molding that comes into these championships uh he sort of becomes the comparison bar and you get out and run well with him it opens some people's eyes up a little bit the young max as i say they'll be going to le mans this year with jmw motorsports ferrari team from the uk and he's going to be paired up with richard highstand who's a really uh good young driver and um had success last year with a couple of gt3 wins and also with jan magnusson a long time corvette driver who's got four lemon victories so talk about being a sponge on some experience there you know max is a great opportunity yeah exactly i would just sort of attach myself follow him around and get that experience you bet look at rodrigo baptista who was awfully quick just for that long stop he's not really getting a chance to race hard with anybody here and with that drive through that margin had gone from 48 seconds to 23. still a lot obviously from baptista to dial and y'all running about just shy of a second lap quicker in the last couple of laps i don't he knows he's that's not gonna do it but he's not gonna give up because something can happen now this could get a bit tasty if we should see a caution but obviously uh everyone keeping it pretty clean so far really fast race cars but they're kind of separated out around this four mile circuit right now it's still fun to just watch one of these cars even solar around here see the ferrari moving around a lot more on the bumps than the porsche was [Music] in his closest competitor that we talked about is colin brown but they're going to get if it were to finish like it is now they'll still get third place points even though they're down a couple laps yes so they'll lose 10 points to baptism coming in so it should be nine points if they stay as they are right now with the lead going back to the ferrari here's a look ryan diol [Music] question mark as to if there's any uh damage that's uh upset the geometry on this uh mercedes brand new race car this weekend well ryan certainly liked it in qualifying what's the word from the pitch during the race ryan not liking it so much right now unfortunately guys there was some kind of internal damage done based on that contact at least according to my conversation a moment ago with david askew he said that it was evil he does think it is a little bit better now because in that incident he flat spotted a set of tires and that was creating a pretty serious vibration the good news is with the change of tires at the pit stop the vibration is gone but the handling is not uh just talking to david it seemed like he felt that there was a bit of a miscommunication there coming into turn one and that uh he felt like he held his line and george moved over and i haven't had a chance to see it so you could weigh in a little bit more on that but clearly there's some disappointment not just that it happened but that it happened amongst teammates the good news is it sounds like both cars will be repairable as far as repairs here on track looking ahead to tomorrow so that's pretty much where the focus lies right now for dxdt racing problems really early on in this one i went from the 2020 evo kit to the 2020 evil kit but it's hard to place blame i mean i think for a start when you're going alongside your teammate up there in a term one i think uh david was maybe being a little too aggressive i don't think george really moved i don't think you know david really moved over i think just that bumpy approach to turn one just unsettled both cars a little bit and they just touched ever so slightly it was enough to turn certainly the 63 car around as he was spinning then clocked into the back of the 04 car as he was turning in yeah well i think there was that little bit of movement by kurtz but it was because he had fuentes steaming up the inside of him and you know i think that's where his attention was i don't think he had any clue that that david was along his left shoulder there at all yeah yeah and you know it's racing and opportunities in these gt3 cars sometimes you want to take the best opportunity which is a start or restart to make something happen but uh it was some optimism i think there on uh david escu's part but he's a racer he had a run and nowhere to go with that left hand lane and suddenly when you're three abreast they're going down into the brake zone you can see it right there just a little bit of purposing there over the bumps right as you're trying to get things slowed down a little bit enough to uh move both cars around a little bit and they just touched so uh they'll need to discuss it and uh the second time has happened this year so um a lot of disappointment there for the whole camp i would have to believe just looking at some of the margins here and with baptista you know he's driving it looks like he's driving it plenty hard but uh his last lap was a 210 dial in the two eight 208 yeah we were talking about it that they need a caution or whatever but the other side of the coin is is that if somebody you don't see it often with drivers of this caliber but uh you know should baptise to just overrun a corner or something and and uh you could lose a big chunk of time and suddenly you're right back in it so you you're certainly not from dial's perspective you're not going to just accept where you are now you'll keep digging you want to be as close as you can and uh try and get something out of this race but they're still in line for a nice solid podium run and i think for russell ward who's running in second in the silver division in second overall this is a nice little carrot out front in terms of chasing after colin brown here russell so to be hanging with him in pretty much identical machinery is pretty cool i don't think that this windward car has the evo kit on it that's a very good point yes the uh on the evil kid but and you also wonder just what kind of damage what the effect is of that incident on the back of this gt3 car with that damage to the diffuser of the veins this best lap is a 208.2 which is a 208.5 the owls are 208.5 so can't be too bad we'll set that lap early absolutely i just love these shots of this running through the kettle moraine the hills here amongst the trees you can certainly understand why this track has adopted the slogan america's national park short shift coming out of uh turn five you need to be in that lower gear just to get that burst of acceleration and easily grabbing the gear to see trent executing using every inch of the road without taking any risk and this turns six and seven you know i don't think they get enough recognition i mean from drivers they get it but turn six one of the trickiest breaking zones that you can find and then you go into turn seven which is a very fast turn that falls away downhill so from apex out it's all off camber and uh so you've that six and seven complexes you've got to be very precise there's a number of corners like that you go through there and you're never really sure whether you totally got 100 out of it and then when you try and do something a little bit more aggressive it suddenly goes away from you so then you realize well i must have been pretty close to the limit but you don't really get the car set like turn through six particularly turn seven and even through the carousel it's like okay well could i commit a little bit sooner you do get a little bit more load in the car take a set through here particularly on a relatively fresh rubber but even so it's one of those tracks that plays mind games with you in terms of you trying to get a little bit more out of it as we watch max root we've been talking about the step up for the windward team into the silver division ryan that's right and i had a moment a second ago to talk with indy donchae who as we've talked about is making his road america debut this weekend and he says he's not super happy with the pace of the car he feels like they're missing something especially relative to the nsx and we've seen that play out over the course of this race to this point but he did say that he's absolutely loving this racetrack and greg you're gonna like this one he says it reminds him of a mini nurburgring doesn't that ring a bell he's been loving his his uh time running around this track he says there's no margin for error whatsoever and he really enjoys that aspect of it and they're gonna have to tweak on this race car a little bit to have the pace to run with the racers edge guys looking ahead to tomorrow but still pretty good debut i would say in the silver cup for when we're racing oh i would agree 100 yes i've called this place america's nurburgring for a while and it's nice to hear it backed up by somebody of danche's caliber and uh we need to get a clarification and make sure that that uh on that windward card does it is that the evo or not that's if it's not then they're doing a really stellar job yeah looking at the rear diffuser it looks very different to the other cars out there so i assume that it is on the old spec that is impressive and look at this you see the front grille as well as much different absolutely watch tails away so it's kind of flared and this one's very squared off on the rear diffuser that's a very good uh good catch and i'll tell you what russell is closing on colin brown yeah this is a really good performance by him and they'll just continue to uh gather confidence and uh it's been cool in there we talked about a lot in the gt4 categories here this year drivers are really starting to find their their pace find their feet get more confident and delivering great results that last lap russell ran about a half second quicker than colin did now what might be happening obviously with the damage to the back of colin's car you know in the first half of his stint on those new tires might have been doing okay but uh if he's it's not quite as efficient at the back of the car now those tires yeah for sure if you don't have all of the downforce there it's going to have an effect [Music] just to look and see what the trap speeds are like between [Music] the um care where the evil care is a bit more straight um down force and certainly looks that way on that previous uh run ward's trap speed was 255 kilometers per hour and diell and brown 251 250 so probably not uh as much downforce with the older configuration car we do have confirmation that in fact that is the non-evil kit russell ward is driving right there as he closes in on colin brown and that non-evil kit you look at the you know as long lived as that car was before they went with the evo and the number of wins it put together it's not like it's a bad piece of kit at all but that evo is definitely you know an improvement you wouldn't make the evo step if you didn't think so so what they're doing with this car i think it's pretty impressive it's really impressive and talking to drivers who've driven the evo could just said it's got a wider operating window just gives the uh particularly the am drivers a bit more confidence in it it's not stopping uh russell ward in the old configuration car just uh honing in on colin brown this is not for position because uh colin and the crowd strike team lost a lot of ground i was watching that left rear corner of colin's car where they had all of that high speed tape and it might just be an optical illusion but i thought i saw that some of that was loosening up that might be affecting things in the back for sure i can't see it very clearly here well they certainly patched up so he's not going to be running a hundred percent there's a bit of work going to be uh done on that car tonight as hinman continues to impress just running 207's two or eights for this whole race it seems like as the team looks on black star just uh being patient he's been in this position many times where he hands over he has to just sit and wait for his teammate to try and bring it home for another win such a beautiful piece of real estate here they call it the moraine sweep [Music] big break is a big spectator area there in turn five got a huge grandstand there it is set up in the background pandemic weekend it's pretty full and then you got people just lining the fences [Music] yeah they've just done such a great job with this circuit and giving the spectators better and better access there's now a nice sort of golf path that takes you all the way down the back stretch to get you down to canada corner on the inside of the circuit concession stands in the center of the circuit by the uh main paddock area this year so constantly evolving and keeping up with the times maintaining the heritage and the beautiful characteristics of the race circuit but improving the facility and the experience for fans who show up here it seems almost you know if you come here twice a year what's happened from that first visit to the second visit they've done something again and of course this this facility has just been so massively embraced from the get-go by the community here in elkhart lake there's just a great symmetry and dynamic going on in life i mean you've got to get to that point you just can't continue to pour money and if you're not getting the return on the investment but because they deliver the fans such a great experience when they come up here they're coming back bigger and bigger numbers obviously this year is a very very much different for the current situation but um they're getting that return because fans will embrace it they'll tell their friends and families about it and what a great experience it is and just a win-win on both sides as we see the races each team led by john meraki there the blue headset on in the center of that frame if they can bring home another win and uh part of this covert pandemic knock-on effect is the fact that the second entry for races age is not here this weekend we don't think we're going to see them for the rest of the campaign unfortunately with both of their drivers martin barking carl marcel who saw victory earlier this year just too hard to work through the quarantine aspect of going back and forth between uh america and canada i hope to see them back next year absolutely you got to believe they'll feel there's definitely some unfinished business and they'll want to come back and get after it again yeah when you're sitting on the sidelines i think you just realize how much you miss it as well yes absolutely by colin brown and uh stretch that gab immediately yeah colin is looks like he's backing off a fair amount his last lap was a 212. i've got a feeling bodywork parts that are coming up baptista who just continues to every time dial gets a little bit of a gain baptista responds just a little bit watching this beautiful ferrari heading up the hill again getting the 300th win for this car the 488 [Music] since its inception at sonoma be added to that number today absolutely it's looking good i was going to make a mention of you know when i said the community has embraced this place for so many years bart wolf who is a lifelong resident went to uh elkhart lake high school and played football for the team and everything and is a very very solid you know club racer and now he is renowned for prepping cars uh for vintage and historic racing while this track is a public pro racetrack not one of those country club resorts when you take a left out of this track and head into elkhart lake on the right he has built a huge complex there which basically is you're just a few a mile removed from the track but it's these beautiful condos with garage space for race cars underneath sort of taking that country club resort aspect just moving it off ground and that's been incredibly well received a lot of teams now almost keep cars there or just drivers that want to come out yeah it's all first class i mean the village is looking great isn't the racetrack all right into our final eight minutes coming up here of this seventh round of the gt world challenge america powered by aws championship and yeah colin is bringing that car down into pit lane as we take a look at the tops top five speeds powered by aws see those uh leading uh speeds there led by the gt2 machines and uh you've almost got to treat this as a little bit of a test session here for the crouch strike team there to make sure that car is sorted for tomorrow they're working on that left corner where that all that damage was see what they're going to do here as we grab a glimpse of the impressive max root [Music] in the am category and he just continues to put in laps and he's just up on the pipe literally with the sound of that porsche he's just uh got it buried been hearing great things about him and then suddenly when we saw him in action here in sro competition he delivered all of the promise he's been under porsche's watchful eye as well so we'll have to wait and see what the future brings for this young man it's great that he's got that opportunity to get to le mans for the very first time that's a box that is really hard the young professionals so that will certainly go a long way to giving him opportunity in the future as well sounds like it's a pretty stout driver lineup yes which means some big opportunity race and uh i think this has been there a ton of times but for uh richard high stand and for maxwell it'll be their first visit so there's a big learning curve but a little bit different this year no test weekend condensed into uh four days of action so but no fans as well so maybe take the pressure off someone going there for the first time you're not as intimidated or overworked by the overall experience just focus more on the race [Music] sometimes that driver parade can take all of the energy out of you before you even see the green flag of course sro itself has another blue ribbond 24-hour race the total 24 hours of spa we've just been seeing some stellar fields despite the uh covert pancreatic situation over in europe for sro and spa 24 what a special place that is this is just it's gonna be a year to remember but in many ways to forget you know and but i think one of the things that will stand out is the fact that uh sro and other series as well but certainly sro at a global level with their operation came up with those those protocols have adjusted them as necessary but we're able to get back to racing at the earliest opportunity and the teams the promoters working with the series that made it possible and everybody has followed those protocols recognizing that if we can't follow the protocols and it has just been brilliant the response across the board it certainly has and it's been really important to maintain you know the premier events like the indy 500 it wasn't in may it was in august right you know so obviously spars at a different time of the year and other sports as well even without fans like the masters is going to be in in november versus easter so uh there's very different times but uh you've got to maintain that tradition part of life is adapting right as difficult as it's been i think we've seen just an absolutely brilliant example of exactly that saying okay what do we need to do let's let's make it happen and they have so so that was my point you know in a lot of ways is how everybody worked together to you know find that silver lining and make it work this actor has been very impressive over the last couple of years here at road america mentioned before brilliant win last year for real time celebrating their 100th victory with mike hedland dane cameron my kevin hanging on for an overall win yeah some stout competition certainly a highlight in his career i think this car is even better this year with the switch to the newer trolley compounds liking it as we're into our final three and a half minutes pinman and ward 1-2 overall and silver root third leading am baptista and diol and dial baptiste is backed off a bit he's running laps in the mid to low to mid 211s and the all still pushing and he's made up a little bit of ground but knowing that he's got that piece has got plenty of ground ahead of deal at hinford's pace he certainly looks to be the favorite for tomorrow even though he'll start not from the pull but the outside pole position but big question mark obviously around the condition of the 63 and the 04 in terms of what sort of pace the allen colin brown will have with healthy race cars yes not two that got banged up as they did today [Music] you've made mention of the fact that russell ended up qualifying sixth overall but his speed and time was very close to what we had seen in that first session so everybody else up in the ante just a little bit so it'll be interesting to see what they're going to be able to do a little bit farther back in the pack yeah and certainly it seems like the older spec car that uh russell is running might have a little bit more straightaway speed so maybe he could make that work in the initial laps and the start tomorrow just hear that car working incredibly well hard on the power not really getting into the tc too much not too much interruption coming off that very tight turn five corner even this late in the run here's russell in the tech mech windward racing mercedes [Music] there's root just saw him in the background that's the margin about nine seconds or so this should be when hinman swings around we should be getting the white flag from one to go here's rodrigo all right here we go the all i wonder if he just said yeah there's no point in just fighting here yeah class act line is there you go there you go all right white flag coming out for trent hinman racer zed jack you're a last lap here in america for round seven the gt world challenge america powered by ad aws championship [Applause] it's been a dominant performance yes thought that other teams may take it to the uh races age group here today but not to be so braced out by shelby blackstock was not put off the pressure by the pressure of indy donchi and then his teammate just got the hammer down and extended that lead at the front [Music] and obviously that little bit of contact at the uh off by the two dxdt cars took the pressure off [Music] i think for those guys you know fourth overall that's not going to necessarily sit well with them but you've got to have the ability to big picture think here and they recognize look this is an opportunity we can take it a little bit easier here save the car [Music] a long way off that's his track yeah looking to escape the gravel trap and that's put max route right on his tail and i'm curious to know if he's got a healthy race car right now as he gets back up to speed i'll watch the tires down at this break someone could be a little bit [Music] dirty how much does he want that position that is not for a class position said before that he's been very disciplined uh in his approach you see the windward racing team looking on a lot of grass there in the grill but this is the final lap so he's going to drive it home he'd have to feel [Music] through the carousel for that group here's trending last corner climbing the hill and that racer's edge acura nsx the accurate accelerated services machine coming through taking the win of road america and there's the team celebrating at the wall shelby loving it as is the rest of the team once again those guys just uh working like clockwork here's the battle for second overall ward'll have that along with danche and windward in the silver category regardless but looks like root's not really close enough to do much nope even if he was closer [Music] absolutely up the hill they go russell ward even with that laid off in turn three brings it home second overall and it's silver for windward and mercedes right behind him max rooney the right motorsports and porsche third overall winning am next across the line will be your pro-am winner max immediately going online pick up some of the marbles and make sure that the ride height is boosted a little bit in case you don't pass tech all totally legit adds a bit of weight to the car and bumps up the right height in case you're running close to the margins here's a look at rodrigo baptista in his last lap hublot ferrari fort lauderdale and then they've got the concourse club support in that car that is a huge motorsports ranch essentially a motorsports club that is being built very close to the miami airport by design and so people can fly in go right to the track drive fly out again helping them with their run here this weekend [Music] is squadron course of ferrari climbing the hill and a big win important in the those points cal for baptista and fuentes yeah it really was a big day for them they'll gain 10 points on the championship leaders so i'll give them a nine point lead here this evening all right as we're watching trent working his way around on the cooldown lap let's take a look at some highlights from round seven of the championship india on the pole in the silver windward car black stock there but there was the touch then the secondary touch between the new dxdt cars in turn one there's also a nudge on the uh as well so wonder if that car is affected in any way see it right there just comes across and just uh clatters the side of the hublot ferrari but just a little bit aggression there by david askew putting it alongside his teammate there as they got into the bumpy zone for the break zone and then down into turn three shelby swings across and takes the lead never to give it up the rest of the way well he certainly gave the squeeze play a bit there to indy didn't he and said we raced hard here this battle in the gt sports club class was a good one then frederick running just a little bit wide and eventually allowed esa to get through and then frederick later taking a run at teammate jason bell but ran a little wide ryan gates wins and then wins again yeah big day for that couple there congratulations this is late in the go and russell ward just runs off exiting two and three and really put max route right on his tail on the run to the checkered flag then hinman and racers engine acura bringing it home for the win in round seven at road america there is the 63 machine and here comes your overall race winner and silver winner hinman and racer's edge and uh shelby going over there to help his co-driver out of that car big big day for them yeah solid day really uh stepped up and uh responded to the challenge by the windward racing team in a nice way curious to know what went on with everyone's pit stop today whether they're just the calculation in terms of what the pit stop delta is just driving down pit lane plus the service was a bit off because we saw no one even close to that minimum time no the interesting thing was that you know of the cars running that were doing the stops most of them they were about the same long you know what i mean that was the thing it wasn't like it was all erratic we saw some teams several seconds outside who are waiting to send the car so i'll have to try and clarify that this evening yes indeed there's max root climbing out of that right motorsports porsche i wonder what happened with russell we didn't see the entry to turn three and what may have happened there here's trent i will uh one of the images that's gonna be burned into my mind here was that vir when he and marceli got out of their two racers at jackery's after that battle that they put on and just both of them climbed out and almost collapsed they put so much into it um that's so hard to these guys run here now this is a much cooler day here let's take a look at the provisional results here of this seventh round of the championship blackstock and hinman one uh with the overall win in silv and silver win russell ward and jaedanche with the uh second place overall in silver than max route and fred poordad third overall winning am baptista and fuentes askew and d'all and ron kurtz that's fourth fifth and sixth and first second third in the pro-am category then the yellow entry numbers on the uh right there gates winning overall in the gt sports club marquissa winning taking second overall but winning the gt3 category and then bell third overall second in the gt two overall category and then frederick winning in the iron category and uh some fun racing and discussion unfolding sounds like russell ward was saying like something switched off so i'm not sure if he lost the abs or something down into turn three but trying to explain what happened the international language of the hands of a race car driver exactly exactly again this was round seven so i'll be doing it again tomorrow as they make their way over toward the victory circle area one of the improvements here that road america has made is when they move that victory circle area they turned it into it's a pretty amazing spot there that they created up in sort of that plaza that they have in the middle of the paddock well there's a lot more crowd on this side of the circle whereas the victory lane used to be on the outside by the media center kind of the right of the screenshot we're looking at right now so you'd have a good little gathering but it didn't enable everyone to get over there yes absolutely so um again another of the improvements and making it more fan friendly and look here you see the uh gt4 pirelli gt4 america's sprint x field getting ready to come out final race of the weekend for uh not of the day i should say for them but let's get down to ryan hear from our winners me well i got once again uh the racer's edge duo of shelby blackstock and trent hedman in victory lane overall and you guys had a little extra competition in the silver class here you guys you and uh and indy were side by side there at the start shelby how important was it to get the jump and take the lead there right at the get-go i thought it was very important it's always uh really important in any race to really see if you can get in the front and really take command of the races then you can kind of gauge your pace from there instead of playing fall the leader uh to be honest i didn't even know he was next to me all i saw was a big puff of smoke behind me and i thought he either missed his brake zone or whatever and then as soon as i look to my right he was there so good clean racing we had a good race car was really really good and uh this hacker gt3 evo is awesome definitely you've been having that on display all season long we'll have you step to the side and bring trent to rent another excellent performance i do want to talk to shelby he's got a he's got a famous family trent you've got a little bit to live up to there but for you guys a little bit of a bounce back on the team side i have to believe you had the results because you didn't have the class competition at sonoma but there was some unfinished business was there not no absolutely i mean at the end of the day there were some some items outside of our control that kind of nipped us in the butt at sonoma so there's definitely a desire for redemption here at road america um but as he saw in qualifying it was a lot tighter than i think ideally we wanted it to be but at the end of the day shelby had one hell of a start there really good move on the outside of three the race racist edge motorsports guys gave us a great nsx gt3 evo today as they always do um it was all about execution today really just execution and uh making effective setup changes obviously yesterday was compromised because of rain we didn't get a whole lot of testing time so um these boys just keep getting better and better and we're glad to be along for the ride with them looking forward to seeing what you guys have in store for us tomorrow congratulations yes sir thanks ryan yeah that is a stout one-two punch that those two put together here and hinman is uh just downright special i think so that's uh pretty amazing what they were able to do and i'll tell you these guys uh still having some fun chatting up about how that race unfolded a little bit of bench racing is a long way exactly here's a look at the beautiful kettle moraine forest from which this track is carved the early 50s when they decided you didn't want to be racing on public roads through elkhart lake and the surrounding community a guy named cliff tufte just decided what let's make a track that as close to as possible emulates the road racing that we've been doing and boy did they nail it i wish i had wanted to go to him to design a few of them it was true so very true all right our winners in pro-am and making a big step in the points are now with ryan that's exactly right greg it might not have been the cleanest race for the squadron corsa guys but rodrigo you still get first place points and you build a championship lead a little bit as well how would you assess today when you think about it in terms of the result that you got and also the points moving forward uh yeah for sure it's good for the points it's good for the championship but it wasn't a nice race you know the tumor said it's crash on the first turn and then they touch our car so our car was a little bit damaged so wasn't nice to drive and we were like alone on the track so anyway it's good for for the championship definitely so and a class win as well you can step aside we'll bring martine up and uh you were in the car there at that start that was pretty crazy what did you see and what did you experience well i had a good start i was right behind the mercedes uh the pole position but i didn't have anywhere to go i had the wall or and right behind the mercedes and then i see the other mercedes next to me i don't know what happened behind me but i saw his rear just almost touched my wind my my mirror and i just didn't have anywhere to go i was we were so lucky at that at the first part of the race so so we're happy we won the race well done congratulations on maximum points in class today thank you thank you ryan yeah that's uh that's important uh and you know when things get a little weird that when racing does that on occasion when you know rarely goes to plan to be able to still come through with a win and max out on points that's how you win championships it is and uh being smart about it and recognize the position you're in and uh not making any mistakes so big day for them is a big swing and um coming in here i really felt with the testing that the dxdt team had done that could give them the edge but things didn't go their way with the incident at the start and let's get right back down to ryan with our am winners and winners and also overall podium once again for this duo young max fruit doing a tremendous job and your stint and you had a little bit of a of a rabbit to try and chase down on that final lap when we saw the windward car with some problems were you actively trying to get past for second overall definitely yeah it was uh a nice little carrot to chase there and we had a nice pit stop for that second change and just put our head down and that was a nice little part try to almost get him at the end there another overall podium for you guys great job we'll have you step over and bring fred on up and fred another overall podium for this tandem and you look at some of the drivers that that max has to race against in particular on the pro side of things what does it say about the talent of your co-driver your ability to put him in position and then what the team did as well with their execution in the past no thank you for that and uh max is unbelievable i think he's obviously uh you know one of the top drivers in the field and this is the very beginning of his career so we're going to see great things for years and years to come so we're all excited about that uh you know i i'm very happy with where we finished because we had some problems uh yesterday with the car and so we really didn't feel we had the car dialed in uh and it was almost like a practice session slash race for us to to learn something for tomorrow so we're excited uh we battled hard and almost got lucky with the second place there but we're happy with uh with our finish today thank you fred big bounce back for the right motorsports guys yeah clearly and i'll tell you for fred you know if max root's career goes where everybody seems to think it will and i would agree that that it has a potential for fred to be able to say a few years down the road yeah i won with him at road america that's a pretty special thing it really is they're a great driver pairing feeding off of one another and getting great results right now they are and they get a chance to do it all again tomorrow when it'll be around number eight of the championship unfolding right here at road america for gt world challenge america powered by aws for cal and for ryan i'm greg kramer thanks for joining us look forward to seeing you for the sprint x race for gt4 [Music] [Music] a glorious afternoon at america's national park of speed road america in elkhart lake wisconsin time for pirelli gt4 america's sprint x race action second race of the weekend and it is the 10th round of the championship set to unfold cars already out on their formation lap i'm greg kramer joined by calvin fish ryan marine with us in the pits and great to have all of you with us here in our first weekend of racing with spectators i'm back in able to watch a little bit in limited numbers following the protocols but that is just great energy to be added as well and uh tell you what cal they've got one heck of a race track they've got to deal with here road america is a special special place but as you see the lights are already out on the acura nsx safety vehicle and we talk about this is sprint x racing which means the drivers race in pairs but we've seen wins in pairs this year too haven't we yeah we really have and uh when you look at the championship season it started off with pair of wins with the 47 car then we saw the bible world entry uh double up at vir then it's back to the 47 car then the flying lizard team got a pair of wins well we followed that trend billy oberlin and james walker junior one here yesterday can they double up here today as well we're about to find out they start from a pretty good spot as they work their way around as i said the acura nsx the official safety vehicle of sro motorsports america and we are getting ready to go racing here and this grid set by the second driver in the second practice session because qualifying essentially was was rained out so it's going to be interesting to see how this plays out here but i'll tell you what for that number 82 bmw that's good news if they want to get that second win yeah the lineup on the front row you can see it there the bright red and white and blue bmw being headed here by billy orblin sharing the car with james walker jr green is out you're allowed to start jump the start here immediately and start to make some passes not jump the start but make some moves auburn that bmw has been really impressive with that straightaway speed he out drags andrew davis down into the brake zone and sweeps across and takes the lead side by side as ken cook working the outside right there of yon halen and they didn't run in yesterday's race beliardo and halen so they want to make up a little bit of ground and go here he's on the attack early immediately up to the fifth position [Music] so everybody's so far clean and through and uh oberlin into the lead early and he got promoted to the front row with uh non-starter with the 191 and racing uh aston martin not taking part in the action here today after a big incident yesterday for jeff burton thing's settling in and cook up to that third position in the b sport racing aston martin they're on a bit of a tear of late had a pair of seconds or third and a fourth in their last four events so looking for better here today and essentially with the way this is set now as it is in the second race of all of these sprint x category cars the first starting drivers in the sprint x ranks if it's in a pro-am combination it's the pros so this is all awfully talented drivers here going after it look at this a lot of side-by-side racing but because of the caliber driver everybody clean and working hard there's patrick gallagher who had one of the drives in the race yesterday the patrick halligan with the drive and great to see the penis racing team back in action here this weekend in the middle of that second pack is the number 50 machine with last year's sprint champion ian james on board sharing the car with matt keegan had a good run going yesterday until a bit of a technical issue see what they can come up with here today here's that group coming in look at michael cooper looking at a way to get around ian james that's kind of a cut pace from last year with the 2019 championship with uh pompey james and uh michael cooper always going out of it patrick gallagher gets a run on michael cooper and clears him through the sweep in a turn 13 nice move there by gallagher again but we know from what we've seen in other races that the aston martin gt4 car is well suited to this track and gallagher put in a stunning run when he got in the car yesterday and look at him he gets the run here and that should be coming up that's jason hart i believe [Music] he's on the move he is bouncing back from big technical issues at the last event in our championship trail at sonoma where they had numerous uh issues couldn't really get good green stars you see dusk flying there on the exit term one big move down to the inside that's uh halen trying to make a move on samantha tan i believe yes the outside goes chris wilson aboard the red and racing amg mercedes side by side with the panos he's got gallagher right on his six wilson does look at this scrum cow behind this lead group that is a scrap and a half going on for fifth position on back up front billy auburn is not driving away from this field andrew davis keeping him honest we can survive this little shabbat will be amazed there's not going to be some pain traded up through these next couple of corners so many guys through so many corners side by side and thus far if there's been a touch we sure haven't seen it but the two mclarens now duking it out cooper right in front of uh andretti that would have been an optimistic move there by barber trying to get by the crossbow robbie fooley making some big moves from 15th on the grid not a great qualifying run for robbie yesterday so uh they were very much in the thick of the championship chase after a pair of wins at sonoma but had a technical issue yesterday they believe they had a piece of debris fly up and uh basically hit an electrical switch on that car and stranded michael diamond the side of the road right here on the kink yesterday yeah it was a frustrating run for sure and uh was talking with the st racing team samantha tan and samantha said she recognized that she was being overly cautious going into breaking zones yesterday in that race because her reference point was the wet session that she'd been in she said i was really over slowing going through there just worried about grip and uh she's been fighting hard to try and hold off a very talented group of drivers here she's lost a couple of spots here yes you've got kind of out of position there and out of sync but she's still doing a tremendous job uh holding in there with a very dynamic uh bunch of cars there a lot of experience all the way around her as uh now michael cooper gets a run on the nola sport racing entry down this front straight away and he's got andretti tucking right in behind him it's really tight now he picks the turn one staying right with cooper around the outside he's still there and travis still have the championship lead coming in here that was aided by the problems with the flying lizard duo of uh dinan and foley yesterday leia fouge in the cameron racing entry right there that blue and orange bmw went inside outside now back inside on the crossbow just trying to figure out the crossbow can get into these corners so deep does he hang on to it he floats a little wide that's algae [Music] i don't think he's going to try and fight around the outside but foley is only around the outside left the inside line for turn seven the upcoming corner just makes it stick and slides through there samantha tan is doing a tremendous job of hanging on cooper goes to the outside tries to swing around wide makes a stick brilliant move there by cooper it was and tan at the last moment recognized that if she continued her track she might get into that mclaren's corner and she just breathed it enough to keep it clean but not enough to let andretti slide through that was a nice piece of adjustment driving by samantha she's really feeling the heat and we're standing this place remarkably well through the kick foley ducking and diving they're looking for a move on andretti as they head down towards canada corner see if you pull something off into the braking zone here he's thinking about it oh and a touch there he had to give it up a little bit there wasn't enough room in one of the nola sport entries nearly gets into them and then they run a little bit wide through canada corner there's two team cars almost coming together sorello in the mix as well had a brilliant run here [Music] wow this yesterday intense this is awesome and then lay a foes right behind cerrallo they come up the hill [Music] ready picking up the drop bmw makes the move to the inside he'll be late on the brakes you can guarantee that claire samantha is now her attention is uh focused on the review mirror where is robbie foley all right he's running the protective line down into turn three see if foley trying to ramps the outside he does she's fighting hard but she's uh just getting worked over here a little bit with drivers who have a lot more experience than her but that's after her she's not been intimidated she's given as good as she's getting i thought there was quite a statement when she decided along with the team and john miller to run silver and not pro-am takes it deep into the brakes a little bit sideways coming off gonna have to protect up towards turn six bmw's got good speed there just out accelerates the porsche a little bit kept jason hart behind her tight there for algae and trying to make a move down to the inside on the entry to turn seven tough to make it happen there this is for battles just inside the top 20 believe it or not you're talking about some of these drivers no stretching the lead nearly up to two seconds here at the front then davis now under full attack from kent and cook talked to kenton at the end of the day yesterday after that run he had where he was chasing bill auberlin and he said uh he said he said well he said i'll tell you he said you know our car was great he said that bmw is really strong in a straight line and he was and then he paused and went you know but bill's pretty good too it was like yeah that's a fact but he said boy was it fun to be able to race against bill and race competitively with him keith roblin is he'd love to build that cushion as much as possible but he's also got to recognize you have to stay with the same set of tires for his teammate here so he doesn't want to burn him down well you think about what his teammate james walker jr did yesterday starting in 18th after a real real uh unfortunate qualifying run and turning it over to avalon inside the top ten and it marched his way up through their class i think bill's got some faith um walker told me he said bill is the absolute best he said and not just because of what he could do behind the race he said from the start of this year to now he has made me such a better race car driver than i ever thought it could be and he said that's what's special about this and uh walker showed that that his stint yesterday yeah and he's got so much experience to draw on but he's also a task master as well he'll be leaning on james and making sure he steps up to the plate when needed to one of the things that had james uh really excited about it was he's you know james is a vehicle dynamics engineer by training and he said one of his favorite parts of racing he said he loves the driving but he also loves pouring over data and when he got the opportunity to run with auberlin and bill is one of the most technically savvy racers in the business he said you know a lot of people thought now you know bill you're not going to get out of the truck early and james said man i relished that he said they just sit and go over stuff forever and uh he loves it he just he loves the dynamic between the two of them and bill's a fun guy he is a fun guy but he he loves to win and he does it a lot and he demands a lot from the team and everyone around him so he's a bit of a taskmaster even though he does it in a really nice way but he looks for the edge in every single department he works on it technically he'll work on pit stops he'll work on being the fastest driver changer out there even worked on his fitness over the off season lost about 25 pounds and he's always been as fit as a fiddle anyway i don't know how he could possibly use that much weight but he looked almost gone when he showed up at the beginning of this year because he said you know what that's weight that's not accounted for and if i'm dragging around 20 pounds over other competitors i want to get rid of it well that's part of that commitment obviously and i just wanted to note we saw the 46 nola sport entry in pit lane that's russell walker and that's a real shame because as you remember they had they finished second right on the tail of their team car the number seven in the am class yesterday and showed some real speed and so that's a bit gutting for them knowing that they had a real opportunity here yeah that is a shame they got other entries out there that are doing well so uh it's tough sledding here today though i mean you see jason hart down in the 12th position ninth in class for our championship leaders right now really a testimony to the competitive level here in sprint x competition look at this group this trio andretti cooper foley these are three hard-nosed incredibly talented drivers to michael cooper this morning on the phone and just said that um you know you're running cars you're winning a lot of races with the black dog speed job entry and he said yeah we're just still learning our way with the flying lizard machine here and a few technical issues we're trying to get our head around so he said it will come i said are you having to compromise the car in terms of making it comfortable for aaron to drive he said absolutely not he said i don't like a free car anyway in terms of a car that's maybe a little light in the rear and uh a little bit more speed that way so he said what i like she likes so that's not the issue we just gotta get our head around this car technically he's giving it a good run right now but as you pointed out when you see guys of you know this caliber that far down in their class let alone in the field it just speaks to just the quality of these fields and what's unfolding right now what a great duel this is two flying lizard entries uh right there together different manufacturer brands represented by that group got mclaren going up against the acid martin of robbie foley there both of them try to chase down jared andretti i think this has got to be a in a way a nice feeling for cooper and vogel because we know how good that aston martin is of foley and dinan with the way that they've run and uh right now the fact that cooper is able to stay right in front of that team car here there would be some level of uh suggesting that perhaps they're really starting to get a handle on this car see foley does something down to the inside he's not close enough yeah a lot of people out of order really in terms of their potential speed because of uh that qualifying session getting rained out free practice two from thursday afternoon has really set this grid and probably wasn't on a lot of people's radar in terms of i need to get out of there instead of fast lap is full he looks to the inside and makes it stick michael will give it to him as a teammate you'd have to think that was a really really nice move that's a nice move yeah also demonstrates the strength of the aston martin as well cooper we know these mclarens are quick in a straight line look at this pushing not quite quite but see what happens here now he pops to the outside fully drifts over to set up for the corner but uh that was fun stuff and you know this might now i i think you're gonna see teams you get into a weekend where on one of the days there's potential for rain for one of your qualifying sessions i think everybody's gonna say well let's put in one flyer in practice here it's important and uh the rain was certainly expected so uh it's really up to uh teams to really uh be thinking ahead and thinking about that possibility in practice you know you've got so many different agendas that you're working on an upright speed sometimes isn't the case but it might should be now well you also got to think about your tire allocation as well so there's a lot of factors involved there you don't want to certainly go out a fresh set of skins and use them up and it was wasted because it takes place as normal so up front oberlin gap now almost three and a half seconds and i think uh kent and cook may have a bit more speed available to him but andrew dave is doing a great job of hanging on to that second position right now they had a technical issue yesterday with jason bell had a really good run and then when they did their pit stop carl wouldn't re-fire at a fuel pump issue so that cost him a good chance of a result and then right behind that group is nick whitmer who even his teammate who is a very talented driver and harry gotsacker has just called whitmer a monster a few times with some of the runs that he's put in and this is a shot that i saw just a little bit ago we were back in the pack and looking at jason hart 12th right now admittedly but zach anderson hanging right with his his pro teammate that's impressive stuff for zach he's really showing people some he really is shawn gibbons and he have got a massive lead in the am championship and uh looking way down the road um chris wilson leads in the amp class right now seventh overall and leading the m division but certainly uh the noble sport team will still think they got a chance of victory here this afternoon they'll keep digging deep right now oh ooh this is massive this is our championship leader nothing he could do but just pull over to the side he almost needs to be able to hit the brakes if he can get it to slam down too strong but just doesn't have the leverage oh boy this has got it right here lucky it happened in a straight line imagine if that happened going through the kink oh my goodness unbelievable we have seen some crazy stuff here today to wait and see if he can find a safe spot if he's not able to crawl it back to the pit lane as ken cook continues to harry andrew davis for that position they're just for that b sport team are really knocking on the door of their first win this year they are he and brian have been tremendous [Music] every race we're seeing i mean yesterday brian was really racy in his stint uh opportunistic passes and the like and then turned it over to kenton who absolutely set sail [Music] and you tend to forget with the way we've seen them run here in these last couple of events this b-sport team this is a very small family team that is built from the ground up in the off-season yeah they've got good technical uh direction though with eric peterson who i believe is still their engineer so they've got some good people i've got a quality group even though it's a small net team and that's why they're getting the results and uh this aston martin in a number of different teams hands this year has really proven to be quite the weapon speaking of which looks like foley has gotten around and ready now and has taken off a little bit there he is then andretti cooper and behind them that dual not for the same class with hart hanging on in front of his am teammate anderson right there but anderson that close and uh let's check another moment here and this is the look this is the moment for robbie yeah just deep on the brakes there and it's not easy to outbreak jared andretti so that just shows the strength of robbie thorne collectively [Music] yeah that was nicely done and there he is now puts him up now up into the with uh whitmer's issues that's going to move him up now into eighth the overall run seventh in pro-am [Music] and he's got though about almost eight seconds though now kelly's got to make up if he wants to get to ian james and there's whitmer he's pulled off that's a class act look at that there pushed it down that's a disaster for these guys there's the st team that's john miller who'll [Music] just analyzing the data there samantha tan was doing a tremendous job just hanging in amongst uh some pretty uh rich company there in terms of their speed and the problem for this as soon as he gets to any sort of speed that hood's going to come back up again i wonder if he'll just take it in down at turn five you can drive through there it you lose a lap by doing it but he's already lost surprised he didn't take the extra time to try and see if there was a pin i'm not sure exactly of the uh locking mechanism there with the pins and the clips on the hood that's a long four miles at that sort of speed that's why i'm saying i think he might just pull off at five he's gonna probably lose a lap anyway [Music] exactly this is a pretty good scrap here as well halen that's now fourth overall and pro-m gallagher fifth overall and pro-am and that's those are teammates believe it or not for rs1 motorsports one in a porsche and one in the uh aston martin gallagher is the only other driver other than bill o'bell and our leader in the 218 range he's running a 218-8 uh auburn's 218 for everyone else so he certainly got pace there yeah he's uh he's awfully good then chris wilson right behind him that's the am leader oh look at this again cook trying to figure out a way around the outside of andrew davis it's a big run here just floats out a little bit too wide to probably set up andrew andrews up to the task there runs it in the middle of the road and takes it in really late on the brakes just gets through apex before kenton can make a move there's a great chess matches look at how slow nick has to go he's so concerned about that hood rightfully davis continues to hang on down into turn five ian james behind these guys in that battle is hanging right with that halen gallagher wilson battle that whole group from second all the way back to about eighth has just run really consistent lap times in terms of their best today all within a tenth or two of a second of each other settling down here a little bit as auburn continues to stretch that lead now up over five seconds so that is gonna be huge for the bimworld team to uh try and execute their pit stop exchange you would expect with the pit stop window between the 25 and 35 minute mark with the uh the upper graded or the slightly faster drivers potentially starting this race they'll keep them out there as long as they possibly can the pit stop window here is the the minimum stop time is 91 seconds correct that's right andrew's just not cracking the doors not at all he's not flinching and you know kenton has thrown everything at him he can right now the problem is is you know you might be able to get a little bit more aggressive and do something but you as you said you've got to have tires on this car because that's something you don't change in that pit stop drivers only that's why i was thinking that bill you know at the start of the race his first few laps when he didn't draw away from anybody too much i wonder if he was just doing what he had to just be able to keep it in the lead let those tires come in and take it easy maybe started on slightly lower starting pressures so they gradually build and get more into the sweet spot towards the second half of his run and make some adjustments during this pit stop exchange nowhere tyre changes allowed unless there's an emergency situation during the driver changeover that that window will open up in about a minute or so but um i doubt we'll see any of these leaders hit pit lane immediately obviously with the silver silver combinations um there's a chance that they'll do an early stop and try and uh do the undercut some of the other drivers out there well i wonder if samantha tan might not come in early put in john miller and then you got john miller up going against some of the ams in the field and that always uh is interesting to watch [Music] so nice to see both obviously the panos team but ian james and matt keegan back here in this championship yeah they're good friends and um and he was kind of managing the penis operation taken over from tom milner senior um just really want to get matt involved and uh great to see both uh he and preston calvert want to return coming off an m championship last year what does that the culvert situation just see how things evolved and said okay time to return and unfortunately for preston he had a bit of a moment here in testing i think on wednesday actually so they're out of the action was going to share that car with young roman de angelus so hopefully we'll see them back for a couple more races this year preston said that is the plan he wants to come back and they ask us to just really put a big shout out to galaxy magnesium which is the sponsorship company that has stepped up to make this program possible and he said we wouldn't be able to be here running without them so that is nice to have that company come in and to do it mid-season in the middle of uh something that's been unfolding like the the pandemic that's pretty special say yeah let's go do this talk about how competitive this field is this is last year's champions right there steve cameron racing regular fish behind the wheel he's running in class right now as we see the domino effect with uh andretti peeling off early albanian the silver silver combination switching up and cilia will jump into the crossbow and then follow holland before the end ready sport machine just getting back to uh the fact that leo fouge was running in 10th and jason hart ninth in class then i was just gonna say because hart they were the ones that looked like they were gonna win the championship early and finished a close second and both of them that far down and speaks volumes here so cole cerrallo is in in the number 25. he and tim barber had a great run here yesterday yeah they really were strong you see the unique entrance to this car let's find out how things are going down to pit lane ryan jared andretti climbing out of the andretti autosport window world check it for andretti mclaren and there is some damage on the nose of that machine i'm not sure if you guys caught that or not but it is colin mullen being installed in that race car now remember the full focus of this andretti autosport team right now is on sprint x they're not running in sprint now this weekend and mostly for the rest of the season until we expect the season finale at indy pretty smooth driver change here as they're just waiting for the right time to release colin mullen we'll see what he can do in his stint out he heads and yeah good shot there the damage at the front of that car got into somebody all right right off the number one 91.004 for the end ready team that's awesome that's good as you can get without dipping into joker territory 31.9 with the crossbow switch over 31-5 or excuse me 91.5 zerallo and uh turning it over at some great stops samantha 10 and miller well they just dipped into the you're only joker one per weekend so um trying to find everything they can to get back into the big points here that's john t coming out having taken over from tom collingwood what a performance by andrew davis keeping someone as uh competitive as kenton cook behind it for this whole stint there's great discipline and placing that race car it's not like the car is slow they led one of the practice sessions here earlier this weekend andrew davis nonetheless keeping a really fast aston martin behind him keeping bill auburn in his sights [Music] but 6.7 seconds to the good right now davis there it's about as big a margin as he's had over cook car length and a half that's good stuff next actually that is collingwood has taken over from tc by the way the 69 bgb car settling in if you've got anything left uh go for it right now even though those tires have to survive the rest of this race so we're right at the halfway point coming up on it so these guys could probably run another couple of laps safely three would be awfully tight well and if you're that tight on it you go for that third lap and there's a caution or you have a little spin or whatever suddenly you miss that pit window and that's a big penalty bill flashing through here's davis and [Music] cook basically four minutes and 40 seconds so you need 29 40 on the clock when you get to the strike really to even think about doing two more laps after this one this is going to be way too tight for for anyone to try and think about don't expect to see these cars complete this lap plus one [Music] could be right at that number greg looking at the clock there two last should take you uh four minutes and forty seconds so even for the leader orbital and that would be way too tight to risk i think it should be next lapping in last thing you want to do is have a little spin on that yeah exactly run afoul of that and again just to reiterate um that pissed off window you don't have to have completed the service but certainly be on pit lane and break the timing by the time that 25 minutes to go mark comes up side by side there down to the sargento bridge and there's auberlin coming up this is uh chandler hall is taking over for hovik and this is miller [Music] he's gonna be up on the wheel as he always is just rings the car's neck down to the inside [Music] his channel a little bit of room coming off there that didn't cost a mill of speed but he still is able to clear him by the time they get to the apex of seven of course chandler ran a little bit earlier today in the touring car race and did a very nice job with a strong top five finish actually he was second wasn't he yeah he ended up second yeah i made some late moves late in the going there and dropped back a little bit now that was a few hours ago and lots has unfolded since but having that 40 minutes of racing on the track here help him a little bit yeah i think so you're gonna get into your rhythm a little bit quicker you'll have a bit more confidence than someone who's been sitting around since yesterday so uh but nonetheless at this level when you're talking about guys like john miller they're gonna be up to the task two or three corners and they're back into a groove particularly on relatively weird ties do you know what i mean the cars just sit sit idle for about a minute and then off they go again graced in by patrick gallagher here just superb turns it over to his co-driver who goes uh his name's joe dalton but he goes by matt to honor his grandfather and uh after all the issues they dealt with in sonoma to have that run yesterday let's talk with matt he said he said we are so pumped he's a dude you know we knew that this team in that car was capable of it it's overland coming in you can see the time there so if roblin he could have maybe squeaked it but that'd been within a second or so everyone else has to hit built lane it's all about execution we've seen some really good pissed off times here today right around that 91 second minimum so um see what the leaders can come up with as james walker jr heads out and takes over from billy what's important to remember is this team yesterday used their joker so they can't be short we talk about the pairs of wins this year so let's see if that patton continues more times the winner followed up with uh the next race win andrew out jason bell climbing on board about his 18th race today 18th session yeah he's amazing and we mentioned that earlier that we were talking about his eight races but that means a qualities eight practices it's a lot of sea time all right james walker jr heading out see just what they did this one's got to be over 91 seconds oh he's awfully close yeah that's okay that's sorry absolutely i mean you've got to adjust i feel if you got a nice lead then don't cut it so close i mean if you're trying to grab track position and leapfrog somewhere take a bit more risk there you see oh real quick we're going to get down to ryan but first just to note halen and belluardo that change over way short so that's going to be a problem for them ryan what are you hearing problems for the gmg unique little car no rear wing on the newest design as you can see it makes it down for us a little bit differently but not a lot of drag is there as he now to sector three which uh starts just after the king he's going to lose that a little bit down on the run of the corner [Music] has to be a fun car to drive i would think just you look at breaking workers i know jason bill's hanging on to matt kagan jason is now um had a nice little rhythm silly how goes right there looking at the inside on colin mullin on the entry to turn 14 able to get it done and here's where he's going to drop off just a little bit [Music] this is dinan trying to go by belliardo and you hope that the crew is informing him that uh don't push it too hard this guy is it's dangerous right there you are pretty feisty just like his teammate doesn't give it up easy so uh that's after him but you've got to feel that you must have got the message by now so you're allowed what two passes once you get word you can go by start finish twice and then you better stop it they just stop scoring you yeah that's all part of the strategy you've got relatively clean air you want to keep keep him out there and uh not bit early and maybe buried more in the pack so he's got good pace big question is now what can dinan do in comparison to brian he's only about five seconds behind brian park run on lap times consistently a couple of seconds quicker so brian has got to get his head down and react to this challenge that's coming up behind him as colin mullin has gone around jason bell so he's gonna go back up there now here comes cilia how gonna try and outbreak jason down into eight thing with that uh on that crossbow if you know you're up alongside the car in front of you when you get when that car gets to its braking zone you're gonna make that pass yeah you're still shifting up it is a little flying machine it really is this is going to be a little tougher for colin mullin i mean matt keegan's got good pace here but he can't afford to hang around too long because mads is gonna be uh that's really tough the year on the dirty part of the racetrack really deep on the brakes he realized the pressure was on to try and make that move and took a bit of a risk there but made it stick he did kudos to colin mullin there in terms of recognizing the dynamic of the situation and had to make a move this is exactly what jared andretti wanted in his teammate someone who's up on the wheel but doesn't make mistakes you can see that mclaren was dancing on those brakes but uh he had it under control across the stripe dining to put the gap is just over two seconds so it's getting awfully close second position overall and in pro-am look at that silly how not only able to stay with the uh panos but getting a little bit of a toad pops out fairly early well coming into this weekend ian james said listen uh we're running on a relatively small restrictor he said the car was really good over the season but this was one racetrack that we struggled at a little bit yep so um they wanted to come back here road america but recognize it probably wasn't the strongest circuit for them on their return look at how quickly dinan is closing on putt here yeah he talked about the speeds dining was running but this is still pretty remarkable yeah and a lot of time left on the clock so both of them run a little bit wide there through turn fire so i'm not sure like we've got target fixation there a little bit and watching brian missed his breaking point a little bit and went with him just a big extra speed there may make a move here probably needs to be he recognized i've caught this man really quickly i should be able to pass him so no real urgency with 12 minutes left on the board but you never know what can happen if you get a big yellow you'll be kicking yourself afterwards if you wait too long this is always spooky stuff but but save him enough yeah yeah exactly and uh putt understood the dynamic there let's think about where travis is so we talked about yesterday how tiger championship was getting between the 47 car and this machine the 21. so now you got dinan up in second and travis now running in the ninth position in pro-am so it's going to be a big point swing back the other way again you know dinan right now is easily the fastest car in the track i mean he just ran a lap that was two seconds three seconds quicker than walker and putt i guess the question we need to be thinking about now this much time on the board kenny cats james walker jr yeah that is a lap that dinan's putting in here i mean mullen turns it 22-6 yeah walker's gotta respond here he's gotta get up on the wheel a little bit that last lap was a 223-7 auburn's fastest lap earlier on fresher tires was a 218-4 so i'm not sure if that was traffic affected by james in terms of that lap time looking at this battle here that's uh aaron vogel right there yep miller has just gone by this john miller he is third in the silver category right now [Music] yeah he's 15 seconds of drift with that mullen cillia hug battle so it's going to be pretty difficult for a driver of mr excitement's talent to get to the front yes i really think that michael dine has a shot at this uh i mean james walker jr has got to respond he's got to dig deep here and find some lap time here otherwise dinan has enough time left on the board probably four laps maybe five uh to catch him gab was 9.1 seconds last time across the stripe so he can pull in by about 1.6 1.7 a lap that's going to be enough to get there mel ryan are the flying lizard pits getting a little excited about a potential overall yeah i'd say they are i had a moment to chat with darren law a second ago and he said look we know it's going to be close we also know it's been a good point stay already so priority is get the car to the finish but he finished by saying look if michael catches brian we're going to tell him to go and we want that overall win if we can get it well they need it too after what happened yesterday they has met much points as they can get they need to go after it here and watching this battle for the silver wind between alan mullen and celia you know that if he gets through silly hog will probably oh he's looking at the inside he can put that car wherever he wants it to go and column recognizes that he's got to make that mclaren really wide there and at these breaks pull him a little bit up the hill but not as dramatic as we saw last year with the older configuration crossbow they've certainly uh made this car a lot more raceable with the changes to the new uh spec car on another penalty coming up keegan in the number 50 don't know who had it but a pit speed violation so two quick ice foes you know your first weekend back racing in a number of uh months these are the little things that are going to trigger here with the interesting thing to me is that uh bill duardo has not made his stop and he's done a lot more than two laps past that start finish line yeah well let's stop scoring him if he's outside of that range that they allow you to have and uh looking at the gap up front six point seven seconds uh walker jr to dinan so uh 2.4 seconds i think he took out on that last lap that's massive yeah this is going to help mullen as he gets through on bellardo and silvia couldn't see if cilia hug is able to just slice by and under breaking down into eight and that's his plan did a lot of testing with that crossbow since the turbo issues that they had at the last rounds of sonoma running in uh i think it was 160 degrees in california's been just uh unbelievably hot and thought to everyone who's been struggling with the wildfires out there once again just uh dramatic conditions that the california community is dealing with look at the run the cilia how can through the carousel like the cars in a different league through there he tends to diamond that a little bit he has a lot wider arc at this entry to that corner and then is able to just roll throttle to that apex it drops off a little bit doesn't it as you come out of the uh oh big twitch there by mullen let's try a break in the middle of the road which is not where there's a ton of grip in dry conditions it's more the wet breaking line just trying to defend he's got a lot of work with uh over six minutes to go to hang on with this win here today the world team have done a brilliant job they've been struggling in general with uh jared andretti sprint car machine but certainly in sprint competition they always seem to be a factor and sylvia hogg is he had a great run it was tucked in but here you see it's the legs when they're coming and closing on putt huge head of steam this could affect mullen and give uh sylvia hogg a real opportunity [Music] putt runs way wide was that laying down the rubber there yeah he made that move and cut to the inside i thought i saw the black mark suddenly appear underneath his car headed too so they're both through on putt oh we're getting uh word here that 37 of belliardo the radio has failed in the car so they can't contact it isn't it they can't contact them i'm pretty sure there's a black flag at the start stand but you know it's tough with this the and i'm being serious here the sun visors that run across the windshields and everything uh sometimes it's uh you just don't catch that one just focused here suddenly slowing down dramatically there he had a bit of a moment and turned fast i'm not sure if he's just recovering from that though he goes i think so all right this is close oh this is going to be tough and mullen knows it stays way way over here yeah silly hug might try and run the outside here has done a really nice job positioning that car but this is where that crossbow was really quick yep and this is the line silly hug runs anyway way out wide he's done this look at this he's in the marbles out there that is ridiculous that is just ridiculous it's unbelievable now it's a drag race up to the kink mullen turns in shallow could silly how come up underneath he's there but mullins still got his nose ahead of horsepower but this is as close as he's been whichever way mullen goes silly hog there he goes going to go to the outside he is working him over here he can put that crossbow wherever he wants on the racetrack and it's still developing for it just remarkable marbles around the outside of the carousel and this boy doesn't know any better well that's it that's it and this is a huge testament to colin mullins ability too isn't it because he hasn't cracked this is michael cooper s we saw him he had a performance like this this morning trying to defend from spencer pontelli who did eventually get by so maybe that's a spoiler alert i should say that before give the info and here we go for the lead oh boy wow that was a huge lap by diana he turned to 220.8 walker at 224 1. and under four minutes to go well let's see how defensive james gets here he can certainly see that aston martin looming ever larger in his uh rear-view mirror here you still got to focus on hitting his marks but then on the key areas just placing that race car off turn five with a ton of acceleration there so just maybe overslowing a little bit on the entry by side silly hat to the inside mullen defends he's got a bit more acceleration and squirt up the hill big battles here for both classes till they are gonna try the outside here mullen being gentlemanly gives it to him this might be it cal yeah he's going to clear him here he's going to be deep on the brakes nothing mccollum can do and if he gets the carousel he's probably going to gap him by a car length or too easily with the speed that we've seen on previous laps so that's the battle for the silver class win here's the battle overall and for pro am and also the battle for the am lead is getting tighter sean gibbers is now only eight seconds behind john allen this is just intense stuff look at the exit speed that dinan has walkers placing the car in the right spot down into the brake zones but he's not rolling through the apex with enough momentum he's kind of probably a bit off the cam in terms of uh the sweet spot the torque of the motor there good job there [Music] bmw doesn't have uh pretty equal speed at least to the aston martin there even though michael's got a bit of a roll going team looking on waiting to see does michael pop to the inside how much patience does he have here one lap to go i believe should have seen the white way flag but boy carries a ton of speed and doing it clears him nice job there by michael diamond [Applause] that was a charge just had enough time yeah i wasn't really focused on it then suddenly when he was up to second i was like hang on lap times he was cutting compared to uh walker made it feasible and he had just enough time on the board now for auberlin and uh walker i mean second in class be helpful in the points that's going to break that sequence of the wings coming in pierce appears a win so far this was going to be five if the 82 could have hung on but it's also going to make the third win out of four in spring x competition for the dine and foley combination really tighten things up in the championship looking at the uh well travis is now up in the fifth so he's been making some moves that's going to help things a little bit for the nola sport team and sylvia haugen that last lap turned to 221.5 and this easing away from uh mullen here there is michael diana [Music] just a superb performance absolutely just from deep in the pack i mean they qualified way down the order as the pr their qualifier the grid was set from practice times here on thursday 15th position they started foley did a great job cutting his way through the field great pit stop of course as you would expect from the flying lizard motorsport team and then michael dinan on the charge here grabbing another victory wow the remarkable season of michael diane and in the flying lizard motorsports aston martins continues here the great opening drive by robbie foley dinan late in the race taking the position winning overall winning in pro-am at road america that is pretty mega you gotta feel that's his tenth win on the year yeah and then here comes celia hogg and for the crossbow team there's nickolganian up on the wall winning in the silver category what a run and uh what a battle between mullen and cilia hog that was awesome great job by both of them let's see what's going to unfold in the uh look at this it's john allen now that is uh one of the pro-am cars that's chandler hall there gibbons is right there that is for the am win right there you're looking at it the white mercedes going up against the bright yellow nola's ball porsche does gibbons have enough time can't allen hang on not make a mistake through this crucial final corner this is going to be massive allen in the rear racing mercedes flying the university of alabama cover uh colors and uh gibbons right behind him in the nola sport tretori farms entry and allen is just gonna have enough to bring the win home and am for mercedes and reardon roll tide got to say it but what another great drive by uh sean gibbons and zach anderson we talked about earlier about zach hanging on to jason hart for a lot of that race and uh that's good stuff and then a heck of a run by tom collingwood to stay pretty close and bring it home third in the am category for bgb well three different classes in this race and every one of them went right down to the final lap in terms of determining the winner really cool stuff and the crowd strike fastest lap that 218.460 goes to bill auberlin it's a nice run and i'm sure walker is in the second overall second in class and i'm sure he'll be a little frustrated well we talk about the fine margins remember on that pit stop exchange it was a good tidy pit stop like left just over a second on the board i'm not sure that would have been enough for uh walker to hang on to but uh would have made it a little bit later in that final lap before he uh got caught yeah exactly here's a look at the original results you can see uh top two overall also pro-am foley dinan walker overland then uh mad silly hog and nikolai alganian and the crossbow winning in the silver category third overall mullen andretti fourth overall second in silver then kenton cook brian putt again pro-m jason bell and andrew davis and john miller he had a nice charge through the pack didn't he and up into third and silver and a seventh overall then travis hart vogel cooper dalton gallagher next up then fourth in the silver category is barber and seralla then leia foge in quinlan and grejovic and hull and then that battle and am that was so close at the end allen over gibbons then collingwood and the belliard o'halen and i wonder if they've just assessed that penalty as a time penalty and moved him back we'll have to follow up on that and then rappaport and derek deboer we didn't see a lot of the rap before devore racers group entry but did want to just make a comment about that that's the silver state medical consultants and fast life tv entry and fast life tv with uh derek and his wife brooke they've got a new mission and partnership they're working to raise awareness and money to help stop human trafficking so it's a great program that they've put together as well let's take a look at some highlights here for this uh championship and uh from the poll auberlin up front gets around andrew davis slots into the lead and he's opening the collapse insane the car is running in this massive pack it was unbelievable a lot of drivers out of position with the grid being set by three practice times here on on thursday where people really weren't focused on laying down a fast lap robbie foley was on a mission early finally gets down to the inside on jared andretti into canada corner as michael cooper tries to follow through as well in this big moment here piece of debris and uh what happened what let loose well what it was was the hood on the number 28 machine something popped and nick whitman had to take it off track push the hood down and then limp around and then this great battle here this guy's really putting on a show finally on the last lap through term one goes the long way around big radius big speed and slices it to the front that just marked a remarkable charge through the pack dinan and foley and flying lizard winning in the aston martin here that road america with walker and auberlin second and right behind there was the crossbow sylvia hogg and alganian winning in the silver category and there is james walker jr out of the car and uh he has a look on his face of ah i had this one yeah he'll be disappointed he was trying to hang on there but um he's a competitor he really is so just looking behind him there there's colin mullin who uh he didn't hang on over that crossbow but man i'll tell you that was an absolutely brilliant defense for laps that he put on just getting back to the michael dynasty yes i think that is his tenth win seven in sprint now and three in spring is quite the season he's putting together just and just raw speed i mean he's always had the potential but the speed we're seeing this year and then he combined it with uh some quickly evolving racecraft here's walker having a quick chat with him he was doing everything he could to hang on is jack baldwin uh series class manage he'll be excited by the races he have seen today the finish on the sprint race this earlier today was sensational that was a great battle in all three classes gt4 cars are just wonderful cars there's just a wonderful dynamic to it there's a real mixture of different manufacturers and horses for courses looks like the porsches are struggling here a little bit this weekend when you look at the results for travis and hart for example down in fifth position within their class but nonetheless they've had strong days this year i'll tell you one of the things that i love about the gt4 category of car is it's got good horsepower they're fast they've got down for us but it's not so sensitive that you get up behind somebody and you lose all the air in the nose you can actually stay close through fast corners and that just makes for some absolutely exceptional racing something to be learned from that yes i agree completely love my pay grade but but yeah these races have just been unbelievable and they fly by i mean that's kind of the uh you know the thing you look up at the clock you go no way it can't be this you know far into the race already it's just because it's just start to finish it's great stuff and speaking of great stuff yeah 10 wins for diner foley i think he knows his way yeah he's still working a little gingerly on that leg isn't he holy doesn't affect him in the car yeah yeah well he had an incident in a different championship right here at road america down in turn five and uh took quite the knock but he's uh dug deep and you're on a roll like he is in multiple championships it's uh it's a sweet spot for his career you never know if you're always going to be in the same situation making the way over to the victory circle area here in the plaza as they call it here at uh road america and america's national park of speed suppose if you're a national park you should have a plaza and they do and they're waiting for them is our ryan marine so we'll be throwing it down to him in just a moment as a matter of fact we'll do it right now ryan thanks craig here with the hero of the hour michael dinan what an amazing final run for you to the checkered flag and ultimately the race win you had a good points day going no matter what how much incentive though was there to make that pass and take the win yeah so uh obviously you always want to get the win uh robbie and i got our first overall win at sonoma and definitely would not turn down the opportunity to get another one so i was right there i'd been catching him at a pretty good pace so had the opportunity to go around the outside of turn one definitely not a normal place to make the pass here but i stuck with it and was able to cover him off into two and yeah from there it was it was over luckily uh rob did an amazing job in his stint he really took care of the tires so car felt great the whole way through congratulations on what we believe is win number 10 for you this season between both sprint and sprint x really well done for you today we'll have you step to the side we can bring robbie on up robbie not to downplay your stint because you certainly put michael in position but as we've talked about throughout the year you've been coaching michael for some time is that the best performance we've seen out of him today yeah it's definitely up there he's had great performances all year yeah he did all the work really i just tried to uh get through the field as cleanly as possible i passed a lot of cars but uh i wanted to take care of the car for him at the end of the race there were some sketchy uh moments that i just tried to avoid and yeah i knew about his pace at the end and he closed out a great race and uh yeah this wins all him so hopefully we're in a better starting position tomorrow i think we started 14 15 today but we start second tomorrow so hopefully uh maybe it's a bit easier and uh yeah we'll have a great race tomorrow it's a dangerous proposition for the rest of the field give it your pace congratulations guys awesome thank you yeah it's a that's a true statement by ryan uh just the the speed that these guys have here you take a look this is the pro-am category provisional results and that's the battle here the foley dining over walker overland and uh ken cook but another podium for them we got so caught up in the battle for that top spot here but uh they're just stringing together podiums yeah really consistent building big points every single week so they're going to be a factor in this championship by the time we get to the end of the season and uh all blind just came up a little bit shy has been a massive week for bill o'brien on many fronts but uh good stint there at the beginning and we'll see what they can come up with tomorrow and a good top six finish in class for cooper and aaron vogel as uh they get their their heads around the mclaren the flying lizard team does and vogel just continues to impress as well let's get back down to ryan what a finish it was in the silver class coming out on top marco polo motorsports mancilla was able to bring it home in that final stint take us through the duel you had with colin mullen and how ultimately you pulled off the pass that netted you the win yeah there was more to take advantage where he was weaker and then find a gap in the end when he had more wear and tires and that was my game the whole way actually so very happy with the performance of the car and the team which is patience and a great performance from you you could step to the side nikolai will bring you up nicolai if i'm not mistaken you called yesterday's race the most frustrating in your career i saw you post race come sprinting down the pit lane to give your co-driver a hug there was that a bit of redemption for you no that was really great for a track like this to get p sorry for p3 or p1 in class was amazing uh especially starting from p12 so it was a it was a really exciting race for us i'd say so it was exciting for us as well thanks for putting on the show oh absolutely yeah they did that and that's a good point that he brings up here this was a track where this you know car doesn't have top end speed and the only way they get to that position is they got to make passes of traffic here and somehow they managed to do it they did the car was really quick on the overall lap and uh that dynamic that concertina effect that we saw much bigger last year has really been narrowed the series has done a really nice job with the technical regulations to bring that car closer how about how about that for a margin of finish six tenths of a second and then john miller coming back up with samantha tan to claim third in the final spot on the podium speaking of the podium one more time to ryan hey thanks greg a thrilling finish in the m class as well today john allen ultimately held on but your rearview mirror must have been filling up there on the run to the check i was holding on for dear life man it was something else my tires were going away getting a little under steer and it wasn't my best drive but i managed to hold on i gotta say man chris wilson did an amazing job was running blistering lap times right up front pointing into the spear we had a great pit stop i want to give a shout out to eric madsen our our car chief who's at home covid quarantine and brandon our fill in carchi for stepping up our engineer grant the whole team the whole rearing team did a great job the car was amazing and that was a lot of fun today but i was feeling that mirror was full it was full it was it was it was a lot of fun watching it to the end there well done to you john thank you well bring chris up those final moments i'm sure you were watching that gap on the timing and scoring and as the cars came by what was it like watching your car from the sidelines just hoping it would hold on i had to go run and sit in the porter john i couldn't take it no john did a great job holding him off i mean we were trying not to tell him what the gap was just so that way he could stay focused forward but you know there at the end we're like you got to hold him off do whatever you can hold him off and he did so yeah it was a great stint that john had and second what john said about reardon and all the guys brandon our new crew chief for the weekend filling in for eric grant of course doing a great job laura and vesco always running the team the way it needs to be run it was a great win we needed it mission accomplished today thanks for the time thanks and uh if you look at that car you and you see the university of alabama all over the car and of course allen is a graduate and a very active alumnus of the college of engineering there and they have a number of interns from the college of engineering that are part of that team as well working internships that's pretty impressive stuff you take a look at the results again half a second the margin of victory that's close stuff so what a great day of racing here in pirelli gt4 america's sprint x competition has come to a close we get to do it all again tomorrow and the weather is supposed to be just as beautiful so don't miss it [Music] you

Channel: GTWorld

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Length: 192min 57sec (11577 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 29 2020