Just under five hours to go with WRT BMW running 1-2. The top ten is Dries Vanthoor, Charles Weerts, Raffaele Marciello, Daniel Juncadella, Trent Hindman, Robby Foley, Eric Filgueiras, Trenton Estep, Elliott Skeer, and Colin Braun. Jon Branam, from 13th, pits for the penalty, the drive through penalty for the transponder issue. Not every drive through penalty is equal and this one is punitive. Colin Braun chasing Elliott Skeer for the Pro-Am title and for track position on the road as well as the lead in class. Pit stops under review, #120, #45, #85, and #04, all too short of their pit delta but within a single second. There are permutations of these penalties that confuse me. You have up to a second but more than a second you are in trouble, multiples of five. It is a one second joker. The joker is not written in the rules.
But now, the coals are glowing to start the fire of the battle between Elliott Skeer and Colin Braun! Braun has closed in and is within a car length of Skeer in the Porsche. But there is a long, long way to go yet. A pit stop sequence maybe beginning. TRG in the lane but they took a wave by so they are indeed off sequence. I think it is a driver change. It is, either to Ben Tuck or Derek DeBoer. Colin Braun tries defenidng into turn one and the traffic helps Skeer! Onofrio Triarsi was the cork in the bottle there. Drive through penalty to the overall leader for stint time violation to Dries Vanthoor, the overall leader! Oh my gosh! There's plenty of data to sift through and the stewards have done their due diligence.
BMW were 1-2 at the time. This will make BMW have to work for the manufacturers' cup. So, Dries Vanthoor is serving the drive through penalty as we speak. It was 1:11, a whole lap, and he should have pitted when the sister car hit the lane. That promotes the sister car to the lead. Hard to believe that WRT would make a mistake like that. So, Charles Weerts now leads the motor race ahead of Raffaele Marciello.
65 minutes is the stint maximum. Vanthoor was 11 seconds over. Daniel Juncadella has moved to third in the #999 Mercedes and Dries Vanthoor only drops to fourth place but back of the train in the IGTC Por cars. Raffaele Marciello newly minted as the 2023 GT World Challenge Europe Endurance and Sprint title, his fifth and sixth titles. Don't lift as he scribbles over the grass! Yikes! He is pushing like no tomorrow. Four- and three-quarter hours of racing still to run. Phillipp Eng is in a championship battle with Jules Gounon. Vincent Vosse tells D.J. Clark that the strategy does not change and they are coping with the penalty.
Vosse takes it on the chin. It was a communication error. Colin Braun tries to stuff it down the inside of Skeer but knew discretion was the better part of valor. Wright Motorsports out of Ohio and Riley Motorsports. Onofrio Triarsi has improved in speed greatly these last couple years. The proof is in the pudding. The #94 BimmerWorld BMW M4 GT3 has cycled out of the pit lane in tenth overall, fourth in class, with Bill Auberlen at the wheel of it. Skeer and Braun very evenly matched but Braun's chase has petered out for the time being.
Don't be distracted by the cadence of the driver in front of you. The fastest laps are in the 1:23 lap range but Dries Vanthoor is in his own zip code with the CrowdStrike Fastest Lap at 1:23.166. Costly miscommunication led to a drive through penalty for a stint length violation. They need a Full Course Yellow to get back in the fight. Lilou Wadoux is 21st overall in the #21 Conquest Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 sharing with Alessandro Balzan and Manny Franco. Lilou Wadoux, a Ferrari factory driver. Her dad was a rally driver and she was an avid tennis player before becomiing a race car driver.
She is 18 laps down after being in Gasoline Alley and we have had just one safety car scramble all race thus far. Elliott Skeer deserves a lot of credit for his efforts. He has won at the Porsche single make level and they have been a great team with he and Adam Adelson since the opening races of the year at Sonoma Raceway in northern California, back in April. Colin Braun says of this scrap with Elliott Skeer, a Silver graded driver, Braun says"wow, I've never heard of this guy, but he's quick."
Elliott Skeer was under the guidance of Patrick Long for a while and then disappeared before coming back last year in GT4 and stepping up to GT3 in 2023. ST Racing vs. Sky Tempesta Racing, racing last weekend in GT World Challenge Europe with McLaren and Ferrari. Neil Verhagen leaps the curb in turn 12 trying to run to the outside of Chris Froggatt. Boy oh boy. I don't think he has raced stateside. He won the Bronze Cup title last weekend in Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup. Neil Verhagen has experience with the BMW M4 GT3. John Edwards going in a different direction with his career, brought in Neil Verhagen, and well, you can see the situation.
The #535 on the Sky Tempesta Ferrari, is the Sky television producers of a movie about Enzo Ferrari. They were given dispensation to run the circular number plate but have the lit up number panels as we go into the night. It has a retro look and it is a red Ferrari, as it should be. Adam Driver will play Enzo Ferrari in the new movie. Marino Franchitti will play a part and so will Jeff Bucknum and Paul Dallenbach. Jeff Bucknum's son Spencer has a chance to win at tomorrow and his father and grandfather, Ronnie, have both raced at Indianapolis.
The TCA race tomorrow, the finals, should be fabulous. Join us for that. Earl Bamber running 19th on the road along with Brenton and Stephen Grove. Bamber is going for it and not letting Weerts get through or the #04 Mercedes. Bill Auberlen not far behind the #04 Mercedes, in the #94 BimmerWorld BMW. We still have a long, long way to go in the race. Four and a half hours left. We'll be at halfway in another half hour. Dries Vanthoor on the comeback trail.
The gap is eight and a half second between he and Daniel Juncadella. The #38 ST Racing BMW pits and Samantha Tan is now at the wheel of it. Dries Vanthoor closing in on Daniel Juncadella. This is good stuff. Some drivers love antilock brakes and other struggle with it. GT3 cars use ABS on the brakes. Some people struggle with it. They want the braking foot to be in control and not have electronic assistance. The newer prototype cars have brake by wire systems if you look at the Hypercars, and the IMSA GTP cars.
We are hearing the #53 MDK Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R might have a driveshaft issue, Trenton Estep, Matteo Cairoli, and Seth Lucas. Will the differential hang on for another four hours? We are setting up for another round of pit stops. Earl Bamber is now dealing with the overall leader. Bamber is racy in both prototype and GT cars. Auberlen reeling in Elliott Skeer and you know Skeer cannot let the veteran by, scrapping with Colin Braun. Auberlen is in push mode, looking for four straight Indianapolis wins.
Car #31 in the lane from the lead. The drive time on pit lane does not count. Four hours and 23 minutes left on the board. This is classic WRT, living within the margins. There is a driver change happening. A clean stop. Even with a short fill you still have to sit stationary in the lane. Mercedes now run 1-2. Colin Braun to the inside of Elluott Skeer! Championship implications in Pro-Am. Colin Braun to the class lead with four hours and 20 minutes to go. They use up the banking, the nine degrees of banking in speedway turn one.
WRT had a slow puncture and likely nursed it to get inside the window. They should be fine on three more stops to get to the end. Great stint from Colin Braun in his first stint of the day after George Kurtz and Nolan Siegel did a lot of the heavy lifting early on. George Kurtz might be done for the day and it will be up to Nolan Siegel and Colin Braun. 3 hours and 15 minutes maximum stint time per driver. The CrowdStrike with Riley Motorsports team are very confident in Nolan Siegel doing single seater races and GT4 races but with only a handful of podium efforts.
Marciello leading Juncadella. A rea; scrum between Chris Froggatt and Bryan Sellers in Pro-Am. Froggatt chops past Sellers. Sellers has clinched at Indianapolis, a GT3 championship in IMSA and now they compete against each other here. Bryan Sellers ran the 24 Hours of Daytona along with Corey Lewis, Maxime Martin, and Madison Snow, all here, and in different cars. Sellers, Snow, and Lewis won the 12 Hours of Sebring in class back in March. A great look to the #555 Ferrari 488 GT3, and a different shape to the new 296 GT3.
#08 in the lane and they will be racing, at DXDT, the Mercedes-AMG GT3 and the new Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3R. Tom Sargent next into the #08 car. Tommy Milner has been the driver doing the development of the new GT3 spec Corvette that will globally debut next year. Juncadella being harried by Vanthoor. The gap has decreased to 5.4 seconds from being at eight second a wee while ago. #77 still leading, for Mercedes. It is the first time a car other than a BMW has led and this is the defending race winning team from last year, Craft Bamboo with Lone Star Racing and Lone Star Racing team boss A.J. Peterson.
They also raced and won with a GT2 Mercedes in GT America powered by AWS. These are the single driver, 40-minute sprint races. You will hear all about race two, tomorrow, right here on the blog. The infield road course does not get the same level of attention as the oval on the pavement, I don't think. The bumps in the braking zones add difficult. TR3 Mercedes back in the lane and so is the #45 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3R. Jon Branam with Matt Bell, and Kenton Koch. Eric Filgueiras and company are getting cloe to that 50% mark.
You can score points as long as you go half the distance of the overall race winner. #120 is in the lane as Elliott Skeer finishes his stint and should hand off to Adam Adelson I believe, or maybe back to Callum Ilott. This is the new Porsche 992 model campaigning the newer car compared to racing the 991.II for most of the year. Second and third place in the lane and perhaps the overall leader as we approach the halfway mark. Craft Bamboo looking to go back to back pitting from the overall lead of the race.
Jules Gounon I think will take over the #77 car. He does. He won in IMSA competition here last month. The #31 WRT BMW takes the race lead, but they are off sequence after the punctured tire. The ssiter #30 entry is now in the lane, too, look. No positional change but the orange WRT BMW is looming in the background, look. Raffaele Marciello is not surw where the team is in the order. He was doing everything to keep the tires alive towards the end of the stint. Raffaele Marciello is a big bloke. That is for sure.
He was associated with Ferrari earlier in his career and has swapped to Mercedes-AMG. He is one of the top GT3 drivers globally and has an amazing record in SRO Europe. He is very quick. #77 on fresh Pirelli P Zeros as the shadows grow long here at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. We saw that this morning before the race began. The shadow is in the straightaway and not the corners and for the final hour at night, it will be spectacular. Phillip Eng is beginning to make inroads on Daniel Juncadella. At TR3, it could be Matt Bell in the car and there is damage on the front of the #93 Racer's Edge Acura NSX GT3 with Kyle Marcelli at the controls, with damage to the front splitter.
Philipp Eng clears Kyle Marcelli and is now chasing Matt Bell in the #27 TR3 Mercedes. The BMW has a head of steam and eats up the Mercedes like Pac Man! Oy yoy yoy! That BMW has speed! Craft Bamboo could have a track position advantage. Farfus too should be in good shape. We're ready for the second half of the race. Stay with us.
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