JMF Motorsports’ Mikael Grenier took the overall lead with 37 minutes to go and looked good to win during the GT World Challenge America race Saturday (April 26) at Circuit of the Americas. However, his team copped a post-race penalty during his mid-race stop. Grenier won the race on the road, but a 1.74-second penalty was enough to give the win over to Random Vandals Racing’s Connor de Phillippi and Kenton Koch at the line.
Following the application of the penalty, de Phillippi and Koch’s margin of victory was .141 seconds over Grenier and Michai Stephens. Rennsport One’s Jan Heylen and Alex Sedgwick were third, followed by DXDT Racing’s Matt Bell and Blake McDonald. Turner Motorsport’s Robby Foley and Justin Rothberg were fifth.
Regulator Racing’s Philip Ellis started from the overall pole in his Mercedes. Compared to most of the rest of the field, the team uses an alternate strategy to try to run away from the pack.
The start of the race was rather sloppy. In the first turn, AF Corse’s Oswaldo Negri Jr. spun out after GMG Racing’s Kyle Washington, fresh off of his win in GT America, ran in the back of CRP Racing’s Jason Daskalos, who was pushed into Negri.
Dollahite Racing’s Anthony Lazzaro was also caught up in his Ford Mustang GT3. The incident and debris on the track brought out a safety car period.
Lazzaro’s Mustang had significant damage to the left front corner that put him out on the spot. Meanwhile, Daskalos, Negri and Washington were able to continue.
Once the green came back out, Ellis attempted to run away from the pack. Unlike other races in the past, though, he was not able to completely blitz the Pro leaders. Ellis was able to open up just a 19-second lead over McDonald, second in class.
In Pro, Stephens started from pole in his Mercedes-AMG GT3. He was able to hold onto second with Sedgwick giving chase.
Koch was forced to start from the rear of the field after failing post-qualifying inspection. Just in the first lap before the safety car came out, he drove up from 18th to ninth. Within a couple of laps of the restart, he had tacked onto the rest of the Pro class contenders in fifth overall.
When the mid-race pit stops came along, Stephens pitted to hand over to Grenier. However, the stop ended up being too short by .174 seconds.
SRO America rules mandate that if the total time spent on pit road for regular service is less than a specified minimum time (at COTA, that time is 76 seconds), then the time under the minimum is multiplied by 10 and added to the total race time as a post-race penalty. That meant Grenier would have a 1.74-second post-race consequence to deal with.
Ellis pitted at the last possible moment in order to hand over to Jeff Burton. Burton was able to rejoin the race with the overall lead, but quickly lost the advantage.
It was only a couple of laps before Grenier was able to run down Burton and take the overall lead. Once there, Grenier was able to open the gap up quickly.
Following stops, Grenier had an advantage of a little more than three seconds over de Phillippi. However, de Phillippi was able to close in significantly down the stretch.
For much of the final 15 minutes of the race, the penalty would either be in play to swing the race, or it wouldn’t be in play. Effectively, de Phillippi didn’t need to catch Grenier in order to win. He just had to hold steady in Grenier’s wake.
Grenier gained a little bit on de Phillippi in the closing laps and managed to beat him to the line by 1.599 seconds. However, that was not enough to overcome the penalty.
Back in Pro-Am, Burton didn’t help his case by crossing the blend line when he left pit lane. That got him a 10-second post-race penalty. The lost time, combined with strong pace from the opposition, resulted in Matt Bell running down Burton and taking the Pro-Am lead with 27 minutes to go.
From there, Bell was able to pull away from the rest of the Pro-Am pack to take the class win in fourth overall. It is McDonald’s first-ever victory in Pro-Am.
Bell and McDonald’s margin of victory was 9.838 seconds over Foley and Rothberg. Washington and Tom Sargent recovered from the first-lap contact to finish third, with The Heart of Racing’s Gray Newell and Darren Turner behind them. Racers Edge Motorsports’ Michael Cooper and Jason Bell were fifth while Ellis and Burton ended up seventh in class after their penalty.
In the Am class, the race was over on the first lap. Despite Negri’s spin in turn 1, he and teammate Jay Schreibman won the race when Lazzaro was eliminated.
GT World Challenge America powered by AWS: COTA Race No. 1 Results
Race No. 2 for GT World Challenge America powered by AWS is scheduled for 3:15 p.m. ET Sunday afternoon. Coverage will begin at 3 p.m. ET on both the GT World YouTube channel and on RACER Network.
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.