Where will we see the Lamborghini, the #3 for K-PAX shaking out. All of a sudden, Luca Stolz is back in front in the #99 Mooneyes Mercedes AMG GT3. Their last stop was a shorty. They might be on full tanks but with worn Pirelli P Zero tires. We don't have a class split in this championship like other sports car championships do. Pepper has plummeted down to sixth place. Luca Stolz leads this motor race for Craft Bamboo Racing. Green flag back in the breeze again. This is mixed class racing now between GT3 and GT4. How much risk vs. reward is there? Nicklas Nielsen has dropped a lap. Eighth overall. That's the pole sitting Ferrari. We will have to let that play out. Ferrari #71 of Alessio Rovera is fourth, carving through the traffic and trying his best to catch Christopher Mies. Trouble again for the #20 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R.
We will have another Full Course Yellow. Wright Motorsports have had a fraught event today. Nicholas Baert is second overall and Christopher Mies is now third. We are now truly under Full Course Yellow, again. Is the #51 Ferrari a lap down? That's a strange quandary. Taking a full service pit stop may have been a mistake for the #51 AF Corse Ferrari while the angelic choirs werre singing the praises of the sister car. Curiouser and curiouser #51 is a lap down and Luca Stolz now leads the motor race in the #99 Mercedes. But Nicklas Nielsen, he will have to drive like a madman to get his lap back and get back around the leaders.
Ferrari could be in a major disadvantage here. Jan Heylen climbs out of the #20 Wright Motorsports Porsche. Game over for Heylen, Fred Poordad, and Max Root. Next for the Intercontinental GT Challenge will be the season finale, the Kyalami 9 Hours in South Africa. They are trying to boost local motorsport in South Africa. Kyalami is an awesome race track and on a cycle, at a certain part of the day, heavy thunderstorms can impact the end of that motor race. Bryce Ward went to school within earshot of the Kyalami race track. Holy mackerel. That's cool. We still run behind the safety car.
Ferrari #51 is now back to the pit lane for a reset. You are now eliminating the ability to get back onto the lead lap. That does not make sense. AF Corse could race their way back onto the lead lap, but they are between a rock and a hard place. A lot of Pro drivers are in the other cars. They want a late yellow in this stint. Everyone at the top of the shop will have professional drivers. An agreeable way of thinking, but not likeable. Let's put $5 on it but no IOU's. Green flag imminent. Luca Stolz jumps to the lead of the motor race and he drops the hammer. He is building the gap.
Christopher Mies defneiding from Alessio Rovera. Rovera has to settle in and try again later on. Martin Konrad was caught napping in the #75 SunEnergy1 Mercedes. The #71 Ferrari is now putting the piuressure on another car. Dani Juncadella puts down the power as we see Bill Sweedler as Mattia Drudi, 15th overall and tenth in Pro. Stolz leads the motor race with Baert, Mies, and Rovera. All these cars achieve their lap times in identical fashuon. Someone has gone off the road. Baert, the leader in the Silver class goes off and on.
The #75 Mercedes AMG GT3 hits the pit lane. Haase on Mies for position. Book it. A scrap between the Audi's as Luca Stolz is romping away. Haase closes on Alessio Rovera who got into James Sofronas in the Porsche. Rovera will try to pounce and jimp to second. Sofronas was trying to unlap himelf from the Pro-Am battle. James Sofronas is a very experienced Porsche driver. He has started 250 of these SRO/World Challenge races. Sofronas has to move over and let the Audi's by. Sofronas has history with Audi and he has some in this race. Rene Rast, Johnny O'Connell and others, battled together on the streets of Houston, Texas, way back in 2004.
Haase tries to pass, but the door was slammed directly in his face. It's a fait accomplis for Audi and for Sofronas for the time being. Mies clears the lapped car and now Jordan Pepper aggressively dives up the inside! A spicy move, like a ghost pepper, from, Jordan Pepper. OK. That was a bad one. Rovera can still move ahead. But Luca Stolz now leads by nine seconds. The Inception Racing McLaren is back into the motor race. Luca Stolz leads the motor race hard on the brakes at the end of Hulman Boulevard. Alessio Rovera is second, 9.8 seconds back. Stolz runs a 1:35.66. Rovera at 1:35.07.
Nicolas Baert runs behind Daniel Juncadella. Jeroen Bleekemolen has the GT4 lead, the brother's Bleekemolen are two laps ahead of everyone else in the GT4 class. Tom Dyer is second in the Stephen Cameron Racing BMW M4 GT4, the #119. We've seen issues for Nolasport, GMG, Smooge Racing and more. Third are Bimmerworld in the #82 Bimmerworld BMW M4 GT4. We never saw Jack Hawksworth race in the Toyota Supra before Smooge Racing had to retire. Such a shame. Rovera has been cutting into Stolz's lead but he has traffic and it will take him a number of laps to run down the Benz.
They were third in Pole Shootout yesterday. Through timing and strategy, they are in the lead of the motor race after a litany of woes earlier on. Another 6/10ths of a second picked up by Rovera and the #47 Nolasport Porsche Cayman loses brakes and dives to the outside! Did he miss his braking point? Does he have brakes? Maybe he was checking his mirrors. That was bonkers! Scott Noble at the wheel of it. Jules Gounon and company again, are now in the lead, having been a lap down an hour or so ago. We have a beached Ferrari. The Am class Ferrari from AF Corse is in the gravel trap. Mark Kvamme spins and back it straight into the gravel trap.
Full Course Yellow again with two and a half hours on the board before we conclude the motor race. In GT4, there was trouble with the wave around. They ended up with an extra lap. So, they must give a lap back to the remaining GT4 cars. Markus Winkelhock, had dispensation to let him go back and join his partner who is giving birth. Pit stop time now for the #71 AF Corse Ferrari. Jules Gounon was not ready for his stint. Whenever you are in the window of a yellow flag, you want to be right there and ready to go. Chill out or naptime or whatever, is over. Get with it, mate.
Mark Kvamme is back on the road. These safety cars and their timing have had a huge impact. So, Luca Stolz is going to stay out on track. Take your medicine and focus forward. Maybe a short fill would have been in order. No fresh tires, but two half tanks to mimic a full stop with one tire change each. That would have been the strategy. Mattia Drudi is in the pit lane and he is down the order so he does not have to sacrifice track position. Use the time if you have it. We start the wave around to correct the GT4 field.
Tire marbles offline again. We've seen a lot of that today. Christopher Haase will be third in line, second on the road, with Ollie Milroy in the #70 Inception Racing McLaren next up. Markus Winkelhock has left the track. We wish him and his new family very well. We are back to racing, with two hours and 20 minutes on the board. Never mind. The Lamborghini Urus safety car is in. Mike Stillwagon, from the TC America class, he is part of Skip Barber Racing School's team and he is the safety car driver. He has been doing it a long time today. More GT4 cars coming through. We have not done the full wave by yet.
This is fixing the shemozzle we see with the #54 going a lap up on the competition in GT4. That would give Black Swan only a lap lead. Jeroen and Sebastiaan Bleekemolen are quick, but so is Tim Pappas. A couple of cars go offline. Soon, we will see another pit stop in the near future. We are going back to green as safety car driver Mike Stillwagon is in the pit lane. Luca Stolz is going to lead the field. Ollie Milroy wants his lap back. Heres a move as Jordan Pepper and Chrisotpher Haase screap with each other and here comes Juncadella! Pepper loses a place and Christopher Haase gets off scot free as Pepper goes in hot!
Hot Pepper? Oh my! Poor old Milroy is nine laps down, but only a lap down from the class leader. Safety cars breed safety cars. Luca Stolz still leads and Christopher Haase too, has a head of steam! Great speed shot on the banking! Wow! 165-170 miles an hour. Pepepr now has to get on the wheel and punch it if he wants to get by the competition. These leaders are not all on the same pit sequence. Leading the Silver class, Nicolas Baert. Rob Bell is next up in the Crucial Motorsports McLaren, who is a lap down. Jacob Abel, though, is second in Silver and chasing down Baert. Correction, there's a lap between those two blokes.
Now, #99 is in the lane for service. This was a long stop, a planned long stop for them, pitting from the overall lead. Christopher Haase takes over the lead followed by Juncadella and Pepper. But the leaders are passing Stolz by. So maybe he will lose a lap. 1:58.2 for the #99's stop. Thought the Craft Bamboo Mercedes would stay on the lead lap after a short stop. Mea Culpa. Haase leads Juncadella. Jordan Pepper is next up in third place. Pepper quicker last time by. How about this time? Yes. A tenth or so quicker for the Lamborghini.
It would be amazing because of the #89's story about sea freighting the chassis. It was on U.S. shores but got held up in the port at Norfolk, Virginia, and a long drive from the eastern seaboard to the midwest. They got the car, prepped it in a couple hors and had it on track in plenty of time. #26 in the lane for scheduled service and they make the minimum pit delta. Jules Gounon, who qualified the car, he might finish the race for the Mooneyes car. Jules Gounon has driven Bentley, Mercedes, Audi, Callaway Corvette GT3 and more. #89 for Marciello is in the pit lane. AKKA ASP, I believe used their joker, or maybe, they short stopped. They did.
We thought the #99 would, but no. Ooh! A hip check look, between Gounon and Charles Weerts! Wow! Jules Gounon has clear track and Tom Dyer in the Stephen Cameron Racing BMW M4 GT4 holds him up. Gounon is driving the Mercedes within an inch of it's life! Gounon is the fresh driver. Jules Gounon is one of many second generation drivers. Jean Marc Gounon drove some Formula 1 races and some sports car races, appearances at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Jules Gounon wanted to race but his dad said, no, only if you do well in school, and hence, when he was 15 years old, he got a go kart.
James Clay has the fastest speed in GT4 at 158+ miles an hour. Andy Lee, off of turn 11, fastest at 115.8 miles an hour in the #8 GMG Racing Audi. James Clay now second in GT4 behind Jeroen Bleekemolen. Clay won in GT4 here last year, but they are a lap down to the Porsche Cayman from Black Swan. Nick Galante, Devin Jones, and James Walker. Andy Lally in fifith, running for The Racer's Group, and a long history with them including NASCAR Cup, Rookie of The Year. Kevin Conway and Andy Lally, two NASCAR Cup Rookies of the Year. Joel Miller in the #8 GMG Racing Audi, former Mazda prototype driver, is back now. He has not been in a professional race for three or so years.
No comments:
Post a Comment