Johannes van Overbeek and Pipo Derani claimed victory for Extreme Speed Motorsports on Sunday at Road America, ending their winless streak this season and the first for Nissan's latest prototype, ending Cadillac's domination.
The pair, driving the No. 22 car, managed to hold off the Taylor brothers – who started from pole – as they went on to finish second and extend their championship lead to 19 points over the Action Express duo.
The race got off to a standard start with Van Overbeek alongside team-mate Scott Sharp, as pole-sitter Ricky Taylor took the headline slot during the opening stint.
Taylor’s burgeoning lead was pegged back in the first 30 minutes when the first of five safety car interventions was called to recover a crashed Prototype Challenge car, before the first round of pit stops 10 minutes later. Although the Taylor car maintained its lead for much of the 2-hour 40-minute contest, further cautions prevented it from eking out a lead any larger than 10 seconds.
That enabled ESM to keep both its cars within sight of the target, culminating in a brave move by Derani on Jordan Taylor after the penultimate safety car period to switch the pair once the Brazilian was close enough.
It wasn’t the move for the lead of the race at the time, however, with the JDC-Miller Motorsports ORECA of Stephen Simpson/Misha Goikhberg further up the road after gambling on a lean fuel strategy. But when Simpson was forced to yield his position for a splash of fuel, Derani inherited the lead and went on to push out a narrow gap over Taylor during the final 15-minute sprint to reach the chequered flag first by 2.356 seconds.
Sharp and Ryan Dalziel backed up the victory performance with a second consecutive podium result, capping a triumphant day for the team.
As qualifying predicted, Visit Florida Racing had one of its most confident runs of the season. Renger van der Zande and Marc Goossens came through to finish fifth, equaling their second-best result of the year.
The Ligier’s only hiccup was a drive-through penalty following contact between Goossens and the #5 Action Express Cadillac during the first rush into the pit lane, but the succession of later cautions enabled the team to regain the lost time and rejoin the leading pack.
IMSA: Race results from Road America
For Action Express, last weekend could be looked on later as the one that ended any hopes of its fourth championship. Christian Fittipaldi and João Barbosa slipped off the lead lap when their car sustained damage in the clash. The pair finished sixth, ahead of the PR1/Mathiasen Ligier.
As has been the case at each event this season, Performance Tech Motorsports took victory in Prototype Challenge. The result all-but confirmed the category’s final championship winner before its disbandment at the end of the year.
In the GTLM category, Joey Hand and Dirk Müller converted their pole position advantage into a winning formula, although victory was not secured without sharp pressure from the Porsche 911 RSR of Laurens Vanthoor and Gianmaria Bruni.
Hand and Müller were front-runners throughout the event, but the penultimate safety car thrust the leading Porsche into the fray after lying in wait for most of the afternoon.
The second Ford GT of Ryan Briscoe and Richard Westbrook dropped to fifth. Running at a slightly slower pace to the winning car to take a podium spot.
BMW’s race day was one to forget, in the top GT category at least. John Edwards caused a safety car with 55 minutes remaining when his M6 stopped on the run into pit entry, while the sister machine had its top-three hopes dashed by final-lap contact with the championship-leading Tommy Milner/Oliver Gavin Corvette.
Porsche also came off worse after a late tangle with a Corvette, albeit the sister C7.R of Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia, with Dirk Werner retiring after being spun out at the final restart. Both ‘Vettes managed to continue despite the tangles, with the latter finishing fourth, ahead of the former.
While BMW lost out in the all-professional category, it had reasons to cheer in GT Daytona. Honours went to the Turner Motorsport squad, headed by Jens Klingmann and Jesse Krohn, who like the GTLM winners were a dominant force when their lead wasn’t shortened by the safety car.
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