The American Le Mans Series visited Canada last weekend for the eighth round of the series at Mosport, Ontario. The event was a Porsche benefit with wins in LMP and GT classes with Cytosport and Flying Lizard Motorsport.
Klaus Graf and ‘super-sub’, Romain Dumas in the Cytosport Racing Porsche RS Spyder, was the quickest in every session and led every lap of the shortened race. Prior to the yellow and then red flag, Cytosport had almost lapped the entire field! This time around, the race was cut short by a red flag, following a huge crash for Luke Hines in the ORBIT GTC class Porsche which resulted in significant damage to car and track.
With the dominant win, Cytosport have reduced the points gap to LMP leaders Highcroft Racing with one round to go
The Highcroft HPD finished second with Simon Pagenaud and David Brabham who was celebrating his 100th ALMS start. Third was Johnny Mowlem and Tony Burgess in the privateer Lola-AER. This is a great achievement for a team with one of the smallest budgets in the series, helped by the inclusion of Mowlem who has a long resume of Sportscar racing.
In the GT class, Jorg Bergmister and Patrick Long in the Flying Lizard Porsche 911 GT3, celebrated their four victory this season and one step closer to the GT title.
Their main rival, Risi Competitizone, were close behind in 2nd which was a great result, given the dramas of the weekend.
On Friday, the second Risi car had a huge accident and the car was withdrawn. The following day, title hope, Jamie Melo, in the lead car was taken ill and was replaced by the now driverless Toni Vilander from the 2nd Risi entry. Vilander performed exceptionally well, given his limited ALMS experience starting from the back of the grid. Team mate, Gimmi Bruni had claimed pole, but the late driver changed forced Risi to the back row.
Speedhunter, Tommy Milner, driving with Bill Auberlen took the final step on the GT podium. Impressive when you remember this car had to be built up from the spare car in just 72 hours following an accident at Road America.
They had great pace and one wonders if they would have netted 2nd if the race had gone full distance.
This was the eighth-consecutive podium finish by the Team.
Looking forward to Tommy’s blog on these back-to-back races.
Corvette followed the BMW in 4th and 5th, Extreme Sport’s Patron Ferrari in 6th followed by the Falken Porsche of Brian Sellers and Wolf Henzler.
The race was red flagged with 20 minutes to run, after Johnny Cocker in the Drayson Lola Coupe, collided with the slower Porsche GTC of Luke Hines. The touch resulted in Hines spinning very hard into the Armco barrier, damaging it beyond repair. Hines came to rest in the middle of the track, with most of the front end whipped out. Fortunately, Hines was OK, other than being winded. As track repairs were going to take in excess of three hours, the race was called.
In the Challenge class Elton Julian/Gunnar Jeanette won in their Green Earth ORECA, while Shane Lewis and Lawson Aschenbach took the win in the GT3 Challenge after leader, Hines’ crash.
Attention turns to the final event of the season, Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta.
Expect a large high 40’s, low 50’s entry list this year as the 10 hour event has now been included in the new ACO Intercontinental Le Mans Cup.
Peugeot, Audi and possibly Aston Martin will cross the Atlantic, while in the GT’s, the Porsche 911 GT3-Hybrid will make its competition debut. Hopefully this year the race schedule will not include a monsoon. John Brooks will be in Atlanta, complete with Umbrellas, and ready to create photographic masterpieces!
- Andy Blackmore
Additional images: ALMS
American Le Mans Series