Welcome, everyone, to what will be the final race of the day on day one of the action here at Sonoma Raceway in the northern California wine country, the Sonoma valley. Sonoma Raceway plays host to round one of the 2022 Pirelli GT4 America championship season. This will be an hourlong race for the GT4 competitors. The cars and stars are ready to begin their 2022 campaign. No fewer than 42 cars are in the field, answering the bell for the season opener. We join our commentators, Ryan Myrehn, Calvin Fish, and Amanda Busick. With heavy hearts, we miss former driver Paul Terry who passed away over the offseason. Our condolences to your family, Paul. You have now taken the checkered flag in heaven. Rest In Peace. With the tribute to Paul Terry, we now go racing. We have a massive field across the driver level dictated classes. New and established teams are ready to go and we have a stacked field of fabulous drivers.
We join our pals on commentary, Ryan Myrehn and Calvin Fish, and in the pit lane, Amanda Busick, as always. We are going to follow car #10 today. This is the Fast Track Racing BMW M4 GT4. Tim Horrell, one of the drivers, is paraplegic. He is using a hand operated brake lever and has an paddle shifted gearbox. Very cool story, teaming up with Trans Am veteran Raphael Matos. Horrell and Matos have been working together after Tim was paralyzed in 2011 in a road car accident. Tim is not at all the first driver with a disability to compete. We look at drivers like Robert Wickens and Alex Zanardi who have also done so. Special dispensation, and so, Tim Horrell will start both races. Everyone supports this. Good luck to Tim and Rapha Matos as well at Fast Track.
Car #34, Conquest Racing with Gavin Sanders and Michai Stephens. Michai Stephens drove with Colin Mullen in 2021. They ran a partial 2021 campaign but did well enough to score third in the season standings. They really turned it on. What will happen for them this year? We'll see. Gavin Sanders comes out of a one-make series in Canada for Nissan Sentra's. Here is another car and driver duo to keep a sharp eye on. The #18 RS1 Porsche Cayman in the Silver division, for Eric Filgueiras and Stevan McAleer. Filgueiras is new to SRO competition. He and his dad have worked on his career and he already has won a major GT4 event in 2022. Ross Chouest is back on the grid. We saw him with the #50 Aston Martin for Chouest Povoledo Racing in GT America earlier today.
Well, Chouest Povoledo Racing are campaigning the #50 in GT4 America, too, as a duo. Normally they have two cars but they have pressed one car into service for both races. We also see in sixth place, the #35 Conquest Racing Mercedes AMG GT4. Manny Franco starts the car, co-driving with Josh Hurley. Franco is a veteran Ferrari Challenge racer. At the time, Manny Franco won the biggest Powerball lottery jackpot in history. OK. I won all this money. What ever shall I do with it? Aha. I will go racing, and be a race car driver. That is what Manny Franco did. Josh Hurley, from California is his co-driver, Manny Franco, from Wisconsin. The engines have fired up. 42 strong around a two and a half mile track. This will be wild and crazy.
This is the final race on day one so stay tuned because we have even more racing tomorrow. This is a one hour event. No tire changes in GT4 America but between 25 and 35 minutes, the teams will pit for a driver change. Again, this field is stacked with great drivers. The brand new Porsche Cayman GT4 is finally entirely homologated for GT4. It has run at Imola in GT4 European Series, a race you have read about and it is also in IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge. So, with all the talk out of the way, now we can go racing. We have Gavin Sanders on the pole with Ryan Dexter at his elbow. Here we go. 21 rows of GT4 cars about to be turned loose. Gavin Sanders controlling the field.
Green flag through the VP acceleration zone. Punch it! Away we go! Dexter gets swamped as Sanders is going to take the lead but Eric Filguieras, here he comes in Porsche Cayman #18! A shemozzle back in the pack as the cars fan out through the uphill esses for the first time. Filguieras is up to second spot. Adam Adelson aboard the Premier Racing Porsche Cayman going off the road and back on. That is the #120 car Adelson will share today with Elliott Skeer. Warren Dexter shoves Eric Filgueras. No tire temp in these harder compound Pirelli tires. No tire warmers in GT4. Cold tires will be treacherous as the air is cooling late in the day. #888, Sean Whalen in the Aston Martin has a tire rub after some contact, some argy bargy.
Ross Chouest is moving up, but Chris Cagnazzi is having trouble spinning the Cameron Racing Mercedes AMG GT4. Guy Cosmo is his co-driver. Big trouble early on for those boys. Sorry, everyone. I cannot pick up the number on that car. Heavy damage again, look, for the Sean Whalen Aston Martin. Once again, I can't tell. That is the #888 entry. This is an additional car not on the initial entry list that yours truly has. Sorry guys. Steve Cameron, Chris Cagnazzi and Guy Cosmo are at their home track here in Sonoma, so they have to be disappointed if indeed they are headed for the house. They will be back tomorrow. Meantime, Gray Newell in the #24 Aston Martin, he is motoring already.
Newell in The Heart of Racing car sharing with Ian James. Newell makes the pass past James Walker Jr. in the #82 Bimmerworld BMW M4 GT4. That car has Devin Jones co-driving. He had a massive accident during the 2020 season and had to recover for more than a year. But he is back racing now in 2022. Glad to see him back behind the wheel, teamed up with James Walker Jr. Full Course Yellow. Oh dear. We have a couple stranded cars and one of them is a GMG Porsche. This is Kyle Washington, racing in Porsche Cup, GT America and GT4 America. Debris on the road and the marshals will get that cleaned up. Bryan Putt up eight spots. Sam Owen up seven places. Scott Noble up eight places. Thomas Surgent and Mark Siegel have also moved up.
The #68 TGR Smooge Racing Toyota Supra is in the lane. This is John Geesbreght sharing with Kevin Conway, a former stock car driver turned sports car road racer. We will be keeping a sharp eye on Manny Franco. He is seventh overall, fifth in Silver. Three Silver drivers followed by a Pro-Am in Ross Chouest. Tim Horrell is next up who will be turning the car over to Raphael Matos who was on the fast track to being an IndyCar driver and ran in prototypes. Then he went off the radar, found his way in Trans Am and now in GT4 with SRO America. Cagnazzi's car is up there after the accident and Kyle Washington's Porsche Cayman is also being retrieved as we see heavy left front corner damage to the #60 Ginetta G56 GT4. This is another Dexter Racing car in the hands of Ben Anderson and Matt Rivard. Anderson at the wheel of it right now.
Dexter Racing have a great amount of experience running Ginetta's the family team out of Nebraska running in Trans Am and now in GT4. They have run Aston Martin's and are running the Toyota Supra as well. A small team that makes things work well. Too bad to see Kevin Conway, John Geesbreght and Smooge Racing out early, a team led by veteran driver and owner Tony Ave. Maybe they will come back tomorrow and do better. They are in Silver as the driver rating. Kevin Conway examining the wheel well and the suspension. Conway was a NASCAR Cup rookie, and his father Sam was a team manager for the great Darrell Waltrip during his driving career.
John Geesbreght is now a college student at Grand Canyon State University, majoring in Entrepreneurial Studies. Charlie Postins co-driving with James Clay in the second Bimmerworld BMW M4 GT4, #36. These two have been racing in the Nurburgring Langstrecke at the famed Nurburgring in Germany as of late. Those are races you have seen in video here on the blog. They were teammates in 2021 and the deal came very late. James Clay wanted to race with Ari Balogh but it did not work. Bill Auberlen and Chandler Hull of course went up to GT3. James Clay is now in GT4 at the last second. They might get a second GT3 car and Clay could race in GT3. All 20 of the GT3 cars that ran before will run the full season and we could see more GT3 machines later in the year.
With this safety car scramble, the drive time for driver one in these lineups is being eaten into and that's not good. The drivers will have anywhere from 13-23 minutes of drive time to go before handing the car over. On day one with the Am drivers starting, pit on the earlier side. Check your agenda and see what the scoop is. The second drivers have to be thrilled though because they will still have fresh Pirelli P Zero tires. We saw tire dropoff of four seconds on the test day and we saw times fall with the GT3 race you just read about. Kenton Koch, co-driver with Bryan Putt says that on strategy, going fast and getting up to temperature, passing and whatnot, is the deal. Bring it in with all four tires. Don't wreck. Simple idea, right?
The Aston Martin is strong and they have to see where their long run pace is compared to the Cayman and the Supra. Kenton Koch has also been racing in GT4 Europe. These two blokes have worked together racing for the last six years. Camaraderie and loyalty are the deal. Dani, Kenton Koch's wife, she is the team manager at BSport. His performance in customer Aston Martin's and he has been in the AMR Young Driver test for the Aston Martin factory in the World Endurance Championship as well. He also is racing in GT4 Europe in an Aston for Hella Pagid Racing One and their team. They had pace at Imola in the latest race you have read about. Kenton Koch was on the Mazda ladder and won in class at the Rolex 24 at Daytona, but then things just did not work out the way he would have wanted.
Now, he is clearly in a good spot. All credit to Aston Martin. Sports car racing is seeing the Am drivers getting coached so their co-drivers can be their coaches and they get real time data about the cars for the races. Andrew Davis and more are so solid as drivers and as mentors to the young drivers. Jason Hart and Matt Travis have been broken up. Scott Noble is Jason Hart's new teammate at Nolasport in the Porsche Cayman. They are quick. Bryan Putt and Kenton Koch though, they have chemistry and need to make hay while the sun shines. Engineer Eric Peterson is right on. The competition is really stepping up. 42 cars initially started this race and we are six minutes away from opening the pit window.
Green flag coming up. Your top five as we go back to green is Gavin Sanders, Ryan Dexter, Eric Filgueiras, Ross Chouest, and Tim Horrell. Warren Dexter lunges past Sanders! Wow. No dice for Dexter though. Gracious! The crest of that hill to turn three is really steep. Down the hill to turn four. We can see the Ford Mustang GT4 of Edgar Lau trying to fend off the challenge from Seth Lucas aboard the #016 Toyota Supra GT4 for TGR Hattori Motorsports out of Japan. Lucas sharing the car with Matt Plumb. That Mustang, Edgar Lau from Hong Kong, is sharing with factory Ford pilot Billy Johnson who ran with the Ford GT World Endurance Championship program many moons ago up until it ended in 2019. He is a hot shoe in a GT4 Mustang too.
Rob Holland drove for this same team in GT America while Filguieras has passed Dexter. Filguieras from Coco Beach, Florida. He and McAleer have won a race already in 2022 as Gray Newell makes a pass on a new team at Absolute Racing. Absolute Racing are from Asia and have run there in Asian Le Mans as well as in GT World Challenge Europe and Asia and in other sports car racing championships. Anderson Tanoto from Jakarta, Indonesia, sharing with Porsche ace and Nurburgring expert test driver, Germany's Lars Kern aboard a GT4 Porsche Cayman. Oh dear! Tim Horrell in the BMW M4 GT4 whacks the wall coming into turn one on driver's left! Ouch! He has torn the left front corner to pieces.
There is a second car involved and we stay green. Eric Filguieras is going for the lead of the motor race and will turn the car over to Stevan McAleer, two Silver rated drivers. The top five is all Silver class driver pairings. Full Course Yellow on the speedway. 38 minutes left on the board. The pit window can be moved and can wait to open it. It will still be ten minutes. In replay, we can see the three into two coming off the final turn didn't work. Poor old Rapha Matos will not be driving today. Game over for Fast Track Racing. This is the old Classic BMW team that has transitioned in branding. Team boss Toby Grahovec used to drive. But they will be busy fixing a bent chassis tonight before the next race tomorrow morning. A lot of work for the team overnight.
Again, Tim Horrell has a disability stemming for a traffic accident and so, he uses hand controls in the car as we have seen with drivers such as Robert Wickens, Alex Zanardi, Freddie Sausset, Nigel Bailly, and others. Pit lane will open next time by. Driver changes are coming. The minimum pit stop time is 92 seconds. Use a one second joker but once a weekend, not both races. Adjust tire pressure. No tire changes allowed. Driver changes are the biggest part. Be efficient about releasing the car but do not lollygag. The leader, that is the Mercedes at Conquest Racing, Gavin Sanders driving. He should hand the car off to Michai Stephens. John Farrow, team boss, hosted a shootout in December at NOLA Motorsports Park and they ended up choosing Gavin Sanders. Farrow is passionate about racing and giving young drivers opportunities.
Those with the means support these young drivers. We do hope Colin Mullin finds an opportunity. Oh no. Red flag. The race has been stopped. Deary me. We are in the final race of the day here at Sonoma Raceway. So let's hope this red flag does not last too long as we see the crashed cars towed away. Ross Chouest and Aaron Povoledo, if you have trouble with one car being run in both races, it will be tough. Hard to tell how much damage #50 sustained. The manufacturers and customer racing support is excellent, but in the supply chain issues we know exist, it is hard to get parts for motor racing and the cars. Michai Stephens was ready to go just before the red flag was displayed. Stephens says that he has been afforded a great opportunity and given a massive chance from the heart and the soul. Return the gesture to the team boss. Pay it forward.
Do the best possible, every race. The team is grateful to be with one another. Michai Stephens was another driver who very nearly fell through the net. He ran at the Formula Ford Festival in England and was noticed by the great Jeremy Shaw. They had four straight Silver class wins at the end of the 2021 season. Former driver and team owner Eric Bachelart, is still in the team ownership game and is part of this Conquest team with John Farrow. Bachelart did the same deal in IndyCar with Jan Heylen, believe it or not. Being a driver you are more in tune for looking for talent, and that is no disrespect at all to team owners who are also good talent scouts but did not drive a race car themselves. Eric Bachelart ran in Indy Lights and did so against Brian Till who is the drivers' advisory steward for SRO America and we see added time back just before the red flag got displayed.
At speed, this field is impressive. But we have seen many incidents. We still have over half an hour to race yet and how will the pit window be shifted? We'll see. We look at the Saleen as an invitational entry with Steve Saleen, the man himself driving with Eric Curran. It is not homologated for GT4 yet. The data will be sent to France to the SRO tech team. Terry Borcheller is back, too, a sports car racing legend who has won the Rolex 24 a few times and he still lives and breathes racing. We are looking too at Absolute Racing and Anderson Tanoto who were teams champions in GT World Challenge Asia in 2019, the last time there was a series and the championship was hit by the pandemic. They are set to race again this year. Nikolai Madsen and Anderson Tanoto were shut out. He did race GT4 in IMSA at Laguna Seca last year and we'll see where he goes.
Capstone and the Snow brothers, "Crazy Cole", Ciraulo, and "Wild Willy", Kris Wilson. Kris Wilson is also known as "grandpa" somehow or other. There's lots of faith in the team and they seem to be having loads of fun too. Okie dokie. We are back under yellow as the cars stream out of pit lane and so we are going to get the rest of this first race for GT4 America in. The Mercedes AMG is a very useful car and is always in the ballpark, no matter if it is GT3 or GT4. 32 minutes and counting on the board in race one, the season opener. So many new names and faces running extremely well. That's good to see. We also see drivers evolve over a number of seasons, such as Sean Quinlan. Quinlan is taking a year off in 2022.
But, others are the same way, Jason Bell, Bryan Putt. Gray Newell's Aston Martin needs a car wash. That thing is dirty. The safety car is in the lane and we go back to green with Gavin Sanders leading Eric Filgueiras. Gray Newell sideways up the hill, doing some unintentional drifting! Unintentional stunt driver? Maybe. Great save on cold tires! Anderson Lau moves to second in Pro-Am in the Rotek Mustang. Pit window open as we see Moisey Uretsky pushing hard as well. Filgueiras sees discretion is the better part of valor trying to pass Gavin Sanders! Kris Wilson, too, look, makes a mega sized move on Ryan Dexter! This could end in tears. Side by side. Dexter slams the door and Wilson backs off.
Playing defense against Manny Franco, and oh dear, Wilson spins! Tanoto tipped him. Pit stop time for RS1 as Filgueiras comes in but Sanders stays out and there's a traffic jam on the 101 into the lane here. Everyone dives for the lane, nose to tail. Anderson Tanoto hands the Cayman over to Lars Kern. Gray Newell hands the Aston Martin to Ian James. Paul Sparta pits the Random Vandals Racing BMW M4 GT4 and will hand off to Al Carter. Gavin Sanders and Ryan Dexter plan to stay on track. Tires are good for most of the cars. Early pit stop takers are going to be coming out of the lane. Traffic jam in the lane, look. The inside car has to give way to the cars in the fast lane, by rule. #34 stays out but he is backed up behind cars that just exited. Gavin Sanders has to work traffic but the Pro drivers are into the Pro-Am cars with Greg Liefooghe ahead.
Liefooghe in the second Fast Track Racing BMW M4 GT4, car #11, that he shares with Canadian driver Damon Surzyshyn. In a battle of the Aston Martin's we can see Ian James playing defense against Kenton Koch. Koch, late on the brakes, makes a pass. Kenton Koch on the out lap from his pit stop clears Gray Newell. Get the points on the board before your competition finds their feet. That's the name of the game. Again, look, we can see Koch playing defense against James with identical cars, with the two Aston Martin Vantage GT4's, built in Banbury, England. Gavin Sanders to the lane. So, what shall he do? How will his co-driver get back on track? That is Michai Stephens.
Stevan McAleer has of course taken over the #18 RS1 Porsche Cayman. McAleer running ninth is on full power mode, turning up the wick. Mercedes #34 in the pit lane, making the driver change. McAleer, originally from Scotland, now living in upstate New York, driving for RS1. McAleer zooms by Stephens while he exits the pit lane. New leader, RS1 around Conquest. 23 minutes to go in race one. McAleer has just uncorked fastest lap of the motor race at 1:46.253. McAleer also has a clear road ahead. Anderson Tanoto aboard the #899 Absolute Racing Porsche Cayman leads in the Pro-Am division, sharing with Lars Kern.
Lars Kern must take a drive through penalty for Tanoto's indiscretion, for incident responsibility for a pit stop infraction. Truth be told, these are two separate penalties. #899, the Absolute Racing Porsche, pinged for incident responsibility in causing a collision. That is one penalty. The second penalty is handed to the #80 Rooster Hall Racing BMW M4 GT4 for a separate pit stop violation. That is the car being shared by Todd Brown and Johan Schwartz, just to clear up any confusion with two penalties being issued by the stewards within the very same moment.
Tanoto made a mistake during his stint. Pit window still pen with just 22 minutes left. In replay, we can see that Tanoto speeding away, from behind, came up, and gave the Mercedes a thud causing #34 to spin. Sports car racing legend Jack Baldwin, he is the class manager for SRO GT4 America and has done a very good job of keeping things equal in the division for the SRO in the United States. The same is true in attracting teams to the series, bringing teams to the table like Absolute Racing who have a fine endurance and/or sports car racing pedigree to begin with.
Kenton Koch, it appears, will be promoted past Anderson Tanoto. This move is for the Pro-Am class lead. Austen Smith had a great start and moved up ten places after starting down the order. Smith aboard the #51 Auto Technic Racing BMW M4 GT4 he shares with Zack Anderson. That team has three cars on three different levels. The Smith/Anderson car is Silver rated. The sister #52 is a Pro-Am rated team with John Capestro-Dubets and Tom Capizzi. The third car is in the Am class with Rob Walker and Canadian driver Alex Filsinger. Ryan Dexter and Dexter Racing, they have a strategy to stay on track and run deep into the pit window.
Dexter's co-driver Dominic Starkweather should be next into the #112 Toyota Supra. Again, Dexter Racing one of the teams now running under the Toyota Gazoo Racing banner. They are on an alternate strategy. We shall see how that washes out. The race has finally found a rhythm. Pit window closed and the overall leader totally mistimed this thing! Oh dear, oh dear. We see the Am class leading BMW M4 GT4 for Bimmerworld on the road. This is James Clay having taken over the wheel from Charlie Postins. A scrum between the BMW's with James Clay and Zack Anderson! Wow. How will this one shake out? Clay will have his elbows out as they dive through The Carousel.
We have just seen the debut of the new M4 GT3 car, well, in the not-too-distant future, probably next year, we will see the new version of the GT4 spec M4 BMW as well. The M4 GT3 in early days is already successful. Race Control tells us that Dexter Racing is under review on when they got in the lane in accordance to the pit window. Toyota, BMW, and Audi race each other in a traffic jam and the fascinating thing is that the Toyota Supra uses the same BMW sourced powerplant than the M4 GT4 does. The first sector of this track at Sonoma, is amazingly challenging. The grip level and the elevation change, plus the blind corners, can really catch drivers out. Meanwhile, McAleer remains out front, 3.2 seconds to the good over Michai Stephens.
Stephens has just run his best lap and he was 3/10ths of a second quicker than McAleer. This motor race, with 17 minutes on the board yet, is far from over. We see Kenton Koch remains in the lead in Pro-Am. McAleer has networked and is a busy boy. Koch, Liefooghe, Andrew Davis, they have all been networking. Conquest Racing of course has two cars. Ian James passes Josh Hurley in the #35 Mercedes taking over from Manny Franco. Third in Silver, fifth in the overall with just 15 or so minutes left in the race. Wow! A ding dong scrap between former Indy Lights and current Lexus IMSA GT Daytona driver Aaron Telitz against SRO touring car driver Austen Smith! Turn up the heat!
Elbows out for Telitz through turn four and dropping down through The Carousel. Telitz gets this opportunity through the connection with Toyota Racing Development, and Todd Coleman, his co-driver, has had Telitz as a driver coach while he has been competing in Ferrari Challenge and now, Coleman is stepping up the ladder to GT4 racing. Drive through penalty for Dominic Starkweather due to missing the pit window. Wow. It is a massive bottleneck through the chicane! Take a look at this mess. How will they sort this out?
Telitz is in the middle of a chess match. Telitz runs in deep and thankfully keeps it together. Side by side racing with a couple Toyota Supra's, look. Starkweather has to serve the penalty. Moisey Uretsky has done his stint and now, Justin Piscitell, a journeyman driver is at the wheel of the #55 Toyota Supra GT4 for TGR Accelerating Performance, and again, TGR is Toyota Gazoo Racing. Piscitell was called up to join Moisey Uretsky and when he does drive he can really go for it. He finished on the podium at Daytona in two different cars in two different classes one year. Michai Stephens is doing all he can to catch Stevan McAleer as Stephens passes Johan "The Drift King" Schwartz.
Michai Stephens, meanwhile, has the fastest corner entry speed into turn six at 88.2 miles an hour followed by Kenton Koch at 86.9 miles an hour, Alain Stad at 86.3 miles an hour, Jason Hart at 85.7 miles an hour, and lastly, Thomas Merrill at 84 and a half miles an hour. Michai Stephens has just eaten half a second out of Stevan McAleer. Porsche Cayman vs. Mercedes AMG. James Clay leads the Am class running 15th overall. Michai Stephens is gaining on Stevan McAleer and quickly. We should have around six or seven laps to go. Stevan McAleer ran a partial season in 2021 with Classic BMW and Toby Grahovec. We have gone nearly 50 minutes into the race and have not spoken of Billy Johnson yet.
Billy Johnson, one of the best Ford Mustang pilots. Johnson has won tons of races with Ford, ran at Le Mans and in the Chip Ganassi Ford GT team. He won in 2018-2019 at the Spa 6 Hours in the buildup to Le Mans during the WEC "Super Season". Billy Johnson has been associated with Ford and Multimatic for years and in the development of this GT4 spec Ford Mustang. Johnson has his hands full with one of the Aston Martin's with less than ten minutes remaining on the clock in race one. Billy Johnson racing Andrew Davis. A couple savvy veterans. McAleer leads but is a tenth slower than Michai Stephens. Stephens is 2.1 seconds behind.
McAleer has been keeping his powder dry and now going to the well to grab whatever he has left. The Pro-Am battle, third and fourth overall, the Aston Martin slugfest between Kenton Koch and Ian James. Ian James has years and years of experience. Aaron Telitz is tenth, eighth in Pro-Am moving past Devin Jones. There are still patches of water on the road from the overnight and early morning rain showers. The first half of this race was plagued by yellows and thankfully has settled into a rhythm as Lars Kern moves up to 21st spot around the #83 Am class RS1 Porsche Cayman with an all-Colombian duo. Juan Martinez at the controls, alongside Nelson Calle.
Ian James, sawing the wheel, trying to put the power down with the Pirelli P Zero's beginning to get knackered. Jason Hart passes for Pro-Am third place, final step of the podium, passing the #8 GMG Aston Martin in the hands of Andy Lee. Tuck the car in tight into turn 11 to have the power onto the front straight. Stevan McAleer's lead is up to 2.7 seconds over Michai Stephens. James Clay leads in Am aboard the #36 Bimmerworld BMW M4 GT4 after Charlie Postins started that automobile. Clay has a good size lead over Thomas Merrill and Al Carter. Carter at Random Vandals Racing is doing very well alongside Paul Sparta. Former Mazda MX-5 Cup champion, Stevan McAleer, he owns a Mazda MX-5 Cup team along with Chad McCumbee who has raced in SRO GT4 America with the Pesek team.
They could come back because the next race is at their new track at Ozarks International Raceway. The Pesek family funded and built that track, and we will see a race there for SRO America next time out in the middle of May. Excited to bring that one to you. Ozarks is set up like a miniature version of The Nurburgring. Ian James is inching towards Kenton Koch tightly running into the hairpin. Ian James and Gray Newell want this because they had just two podiums in 2021 at the Watkins Glen doubleheader. Ian James has the speed and the ability to put the car where he wants it. Koch opens the door and here comes James 'round the outside!
James, sawing the wheel, look, and here comes Kenton Koch to take the place back! It's a drag race to the final turn! Koch gives James space and he might just make a clean pass here. Bang on the money. He does it. That is good, clean, first class motor racing right before your eyes ladies and gentlemen. James is going to all he knows to hang on. Lurking in the background, look, reigning Pro-Am champion, Jason Hart. He wants a bite of the cherry before the checkers, but is running out of time. Stevan McAleer leads still and Michai Stephens has closed in to a 2.2 second gap. But McAleer is controlling the motor race from the front.
I believe there are two laps left. We may see the white flag this time around. Less than a minute on the clock. 45 seconds. A time certain race, this. Michai Stephens from the Chicago suburb of Evanston, Illinois. White flag now. One lap to go. Wow! What has happened to Ian James? He has been passed by both Kenton Koch and Jason Hart? How on earth did that happen? Koch leads but Hart will be right on his gearbox. Poor old Ian James is off the pace! Deary me. Well, he will have to come back tomorrow and try again. Koch leads the Pro-Am class. Andy Lee is also in the picture. Ian James better hope he can hang on by his fingernails for one more lap. In Am, the battle is hot and heavy too. James Clay does not have it sewn up yet. Thomas Merrill is right behind him, steaming along at full bore.
The clock has gone to zero, but the battles are not done yet. Merrill has one of the new Nolasport Porsche Cayman's too. Well, it is at least a Cayman. Not sure which team. I think it's Nolasport. But Stevan McAleer will win for RS1, in race one at Sonoma! Wow. Kenton Koch has managed the gap and he and Bryan Putt get the second win for BSport in Pro-Am. Ian James has dropped like a stone in eighth place. James Clay being harried by Thomas Merrill. James Clay and Bimmerworld win in the Am class. Wow! That was a wild one at the end of the motor race! The first 20 minutes with the red flag slowed the race down, but the second half was a sizzler!
McAleer wins the race by 1.6 seconds.
Overall/Silver: #18 Filguieras/McAleer RS1 Porsche Cayman GT4 RS Clubsport
Pro-Am: #15 Koch/Putt BSport Racing Aston Martin Vantage GT4
Am: #36 Clay/Postins Bimmerworld Racing BMW M4 GT4
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So, that is the final race on Saturday for SRO America at Sonoma Raceway. We will be back tomorrow to bring you all of the Sunday action. Stay tuned. Good night, from the wine country of northern California. Take care, and we'll see you tomorrow for more motor racing. Bye bye.
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