IMSA announced Friday (Aug. 7) that penalties have been assessed to Porsche Penske Motorsport’s Kevin Estre in the wake of a controversial crash Sunday (Aug. 2) with Action Express Racing’s Jack Aitken. This crash resulted in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Motul SportsCar Endurance Grand Prix at Road America ending under yellow.
In the clip above, Estre more or less forces Aitken off the road, resulting in Aitken spinning through the gravel trap in turn 1 and hitting the barrier. Estre spins and crashes as well.
In their press release, IMSA has assessed a time penalty equal to the stiffest possible in the IMSA Sporting Regulations, a five minute stop-and-hold penalty. That time was added onto Estre’s final race time. As a result, he and Laurens Vanthoor dropped from eighth to 10th in class.
The penalty actually moves Aitken’s No. 31 Cadillac up one place to eighth. That affects the points as Aitken’s point lead has increased from 108 to 118 points over JDC-Miller MotorSports’ Laurin Heinrich.
In addition, IMSA considers Estre’s actions to constitute unjustifiable risk. As a result, he has been placed on probation for the remainder of the year. Any other transgressions during the probation could result in suspension.
In the Sporting Regulations, any penalty for unjustifiable risk is considered to be conclusive. As a result, Penske Porsche Motorsport cannot appeal the penalty.
The contact came after an additional controversial incident involving Aitken having contact with the No. 7 Porsche of Felipe Nasr earlier in the race. Nasr was hit from behind by Aitken entering turn 6 and spun into the gravel. IMSA officials at the time chose to take no action.
In IMSA, unjustifiable risk is considered to be behavior and/or actions that represent an unnecessary risk or outright reckless endangerment. Penalties for this infraction can be anything from a time penalty up to outright suspension.
It is extremely rare for unjustifiable risk to be cited by IMSA officials. In 2014, two different drivers in the LMPC class, Gaston Kearby and Alex Tagliani, were suspended due to unjustifiable risk in separate crashes. Kearby’s suspension came due to a crash that occurred during the Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring.
Back in June, former NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series racer Brandon Gdovic suffered a broken left leg in three places, a concussion and a bunch of bone bruises in a huge crash in Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America Race No. 2 at Watkins Glen. That crash happened due to Luke Berkeley getting in the back of him in the Esses. IMSA officials determined that Berkeley’s contact constituted unjustifiable risk and parked him on the spot.
Phil Allaway has three primary roles at Frontstretch. He's the manager of the Frontstretch email 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 Frontstretch 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.