Turner Motorsport’s Justin Rothberg led flag-to-flag from the overall pole Friday (Oct. 4) to win GT America powered by AWS Race No. 1 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. It is Rothberg’s third win of the year and keeps him in championship contention.
Rothberg’s margin of victory was 3.167 seconds over SKI Autosports’ Johnny O’Connell. GMG Racing’s James Sofronas was third, followed by the second GMG Racing entry, a Porsche for Kyle Washington. Mishumotors’ Mirco Schultis was fifth.
Rothberg started from pole in his BMW. James Sofronas tried to make a move to Rothberg’s outside in turn 1 for the lead, but went wide and dropped back to fifth.
Rothberg was able to pull out a one-second lead over O’Connell in the opening lap. He was able to hold onto that.
Further back, O’Connell’s main championship competition, Jason Daskalos ran into the GT4 McLaren of Alan Grossberg, spinning Grossberg out in turn 10. The situation could have resulted in a penalty being given to Daskalos, but the stewards chose not to take action.
Despite avoiding a costly penalty, Daskalos didn’t seem to have the pace to stick with the leaders. As a result, he was overtaken first by Sofronas, then by Washington to drop to sixth.
In the closing laps, Daskalos’ car came to life. He was able to get back past Washington and put the pressure on Schultis for fourth.
On the final lap, things came to a head. While Rothberg was taking the win, contact was made between Daskalos and Schultis in turn 12, resulting in Schultis’ Callaway Corvette spinning out.
In this incident, Daskalos was passed by Washington, but held on to finish fifth on the road. However, SRO America stewards gave Daskalos a post-race drive-through penalty of 68 seconds for the contact.
The penalty dropped Daskalos from fifth to seventh. As a result, Daskalos’ points lead is down from 18 points to six with one race remaining. Rothberg is only 14 points back as well. That margin is small enough that the only way Daskalos would be able to guarantee the championship would be to win on Sunday.
In GT4, Rotek Racing’s Isaac Sherman, who has already clinched the championship, led the field to green in his Porsche. It didn’t take long for Sherman to pull away from the rest of the class once again. 14 minutes into the race, Sherman had a six-second lead over ACI Motorsports’ Curt Swearingin.
While Sherman ran away from the pack, Swearingin ended up in a duel with The Heart of Racing’s Gray Newell. That battle came down to the final couple of laps. Newell tried to take advantage of Washington opening a hole to try to go for second in turn 12.
Contact was made, resulting in Swearingin spinning out in his Porsche. Newell was able to continue without issue.
Sherman was never threatened en route to his 12th win of the season. Newell crossed the line in second, then was given the equivalent of a drive-through penalty for the contact with Swearingin, similar to what happened with Daskalos.
As a result, Sherman’s margin of victory was 28.062 seconds over Flying Lizard Motorsports’ Damir Hot. Swearingin ended up third, then Carrus Callus Raceteam’s Nick Shanny. Grossberg was fifth.
The penalty dropped Newell down from second to seventh in class. Newell was five seconds ahead of Hot at the finish.
GT America powered by AWS: Indianapolis Race No. 1 Results
Rothberg set the fastest lap of the race at 102.963 mph. That gives him the pole for the final race of the season. That race is scheduled for 8:35 a.m. ET Sunday morning. It will be streamed live on both the GT World YouTube channel and on SpeedSport1.
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the site's FREE e-mail newsletter that publishes Monday-Friday and occasionally on weekends. He keeps TV broadcasters honest with weekly editions of Couch Potato Tuesday and serves as the site's Sports Car racing editor.
Outside of Frontstretch, Phil is the press officer for Lebanon Valley Speedway in West Lebanon, N.Y. He covers all the action on the high-banked dirt track from regular DIRTcar Modified racing to occasional visits from touring series such as the Super DIRTcar Series.