Weather was an issue Saturday (Aug. 16) at Road America. Regulator Racing took advantage of their alternate driver strategy that allowed Philip Ellis and Jeff Burton to be in front when lightning ended GT World Challenge America powered by AWS Race No. 1 after 42 of 90 minutes.
Random Vandals Racing’s Kenton Koch and Connor de Phillippi were second, then teammates Bill Auberlen and Varun Choksey. JMF Motorsports’ Mikael Grenier and Michai Stephens were fourth, while Rennsport One’s Jan Heylen and Alex Sedgwick were fifth.
Ellis started from the pole in his Pro-Am Mercedes on a mostly 4.048-mile circuit. That said, there were still plenty of damp spots.’
Ellis’ goal is always to get away from the field as much as possible to make his strategy work. To that end, he led the field to green very slowly before stomping on the accelerator to get a gap.
With the weather not looking good, Ellis was in even more of a hurry. In nine minutes, he pulled out to a 12 second lead in class over Justin Rothberg.
Shortly afterwards, there was a huge crash at the Kink, at least partially caused by the previous rain. Dollahite Racing’s Scott Dollahite just barely clipped the curb entering the Kink and lost control of his Mustang. The result was this nasty crash.
Archangel Motorsports’ Todd Coleman also spun to avoid Dollahite and ended up in the wall in his McLaren. Both drivers were uninjured, but their cars were heavily damaged.
The caution more or less ruined Regulator Racing’s strategy, which is normally dependent on Race No. 1 going caution-free. Once the green came back, Ellis tried to run away once again.
This time, he was able to get even further out in front. His advantage over Rothberg was more than 18 seconds with 52 minutes to go. However, this was under threatening skies.
A lightning strike within eight miles of the track brought out the full course yellow at that point. Cars traversed the circuit for another lap before the red flag came out.
During that red flag, the heavens opened and doused the track with rain. A little more than 20 minutes into the delay, the race was declared complete, giving Burton and Ellis the victory.
Rothberg and Robby Foley finished second in Pro-Am on the road, but they were moved to seventh in class afterwards. This is due to a driver ranking ruling that SRO America made for Rothberg earlier this season. He is considered to be a Silver-rated driver, but competes in SRO America under a Bronze* designation. That requires whatever car he drives to carry extra weight.
In GT World Challenge America powered by AWS races, it also means that the team has an extra five seconds added to their mandatory pit stop in each race. Since the mid-race stops never happened, they added five seconds to Rothberg and Foley’s race time. Since the race ended with the field behind the safety car, it took them out of the top-five.
DXDT Racing’s Matt Bell and Blake McDonald were promoted to second in class after Foley and Rothberg’s penalty. AF Corse’s Christian and Marcelo Hahn were third in their Ferrari, then CRP Racing’s Jason Daskalos and Isaac Sherman. Chouest Povoledo Racing’s Ross Chouest and Aaron Povoledo were fifth.
In Pro, Stephens started on the class pole in second. He was able to keep Ellis in sight early on, but could do nothing with him. Random Vandals Racing’s Koch was close to Stephens, but chose to stay behind him.
The Dollahite crash resulted in a restart 26 minutes into the race. Here, Koch chose to pounce.
Exiting turn 1, Koch got a run on Stephens. By turn 3, the No. 99 BMW was past into the Pro lead. Teammate Choksey was able to get a run on Stephens exiting turn 3 and beat him to turn 5 to take second.
Koch was unable to keep with Ellis. By the time the yellow flew, he was four seconds back. But that was ultimately all he needed to do in order to take the class win.
In Am, Dollahite Racing’s Scott Dollahite started on pole in his Ford Mustang in 13th. He was easily able to drive away from AF Corse’s Jay Schreibman, who fell to the rear of the field quickly.
However, Dollahite’s big crash 10 minutes into the race decided the race. Schreibman avoided the wreck and reclaimed the class lead. From there, Schreibman and Oswaldo Negri Jr. held on to win.
GT World Challenge America powered by AWS: Road America Race No. 1 Results
Race No. 2 for GT World Challenge America powered by AWS at Road America is scheduled to go green at 3:45 p.m. ET Sunday. Live coverage of the race will begin at 3:30 p.m. ET on both RACER Network and the GT World YouTube channel.
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.