While wet, rainy weather for much of the weekend made getting around Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course treacherous, as evidenced by the number of vehicles needing towed out of grassy fields over the three-day event, as well as the need to set up alternate locations for campers, the racing for IMSA’s Acura Sports Car Challenge went off without a hitch.
In Sunday’s Acura Sports Car Challenge, the duo of Dane Cameron and Juan Pablo Montoya, riding as one of Acura Team Penske’s teams, claimed first place after 123 laps of a 36-car race. The duo, competing in the DPi group, led at four separate times during the race, including the final 59 laps.
The rest of the top 10 also involved DPi cars, with the team of Oliver Jarvis and Tristan Nunez placing second and the duo of Ryan Hunter-Reay and Jonathan Bornarito running third. Last year’s champions — Ricky Taylor and Helio Castroneves finished third.
There were three other groups in the race. In the LMP2 group, Matthew McMurry and Eric Lux finished 11th overall to win, while the only other car, that of Kyle Masson and Cameron Cassels, took 34th.
The GTLM group was won by Laurens Vanthoor and Earl Bamber, who were 12th overall; while Antonio Garcia and Jan Magnussen were second and 13th overall.
Winning the GTD group and placing 19th in the race was the team of Jack Hawksworth and Richard Heistand. Trent Hindman and Mario Farnbacker placed 20th to be the second-best finisher in their group.
The 37-car Michelin Pilot Challenge was the main event for Saturday’s racing. Divided into two groups, the race and GS group was won by the team of Trent Hindman and Alan Brynjolfsson, who completed 68 laps. Second place went to the team of Dylan Murry and James Cox, while Jeff Westphal and Tyler McQuarrie finished third.
In the TCR class, Mark Wilkins and Michael Lewis finished first. They were fifth overall. The second-place team in that class was that of Gavin Ernstone and Jon Morley, who also were seventh in the overall standings.
On Sunday morning, the Prototype Challenge race took place, with the duo of Dylan Murry and Dakota Dickerson claiming first place through 65 laps. Neil Alberico and Leo Lamelas ran second and Tonis Kasernets and Bruce Hamilton finished in third place.
On both Saturday and Sunday, a shorter race was held in the Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge. The cars went 22 laps on Saturday and 30 on Sunday, while competing in Platinum and Gold classes.
Parker Thompson won Saturday’s Platinum class and also was first overall. He was followed by Roman DeAngelis and Maxwell Root, who took second and third respectively. Sebastian Carazo was sixth overall to win the Gold class. Rob Ferriol took seventh place to be runner-up in that class.
In Sunday’s race, DeAngelis moved up to first place in winning the Platinum class. Thompson finished second and Root earned third place for the second straight day.
The top two finishers in the Gold class were the same, with Carazo placing 10th overall and Ferriol finishing 11th.
