World Challenge race at Mid Ohio

[tdyguy2k]

Anybody going to the race at Mid Ohio this year? ocker:

 

[Tuna]

That would be nice but no chance - this year.

The Mid-Ohio race is shaping up to be one of the biggest fields in World Challenge history. 78 Cars are entered in all categories. GT and GT-A have 23 cars, GTS has 28. That's a lot of cars on the track at one time for the GT/GT-A/GTS races.

Cadillac Racing has the lead in both the driver's and manufacturer's championships with most of their points gained on the street circuits. This is a road course and neither Johnny nor Andy have had a lot of success on road courses this year. Johnny has 3 podiums on road courses while Andy has only 1 on road courses. The CTS V.R seems to be better on the street courses this year although they didn't do as well in the last race on Toronto's street - after 3 performance adjustments this year -- "The team has been hit with three performance adjustments that have reduced horsepower and added 130 lbs. to the CTS.V.Rs." The GT3 R competitors also seem to have more down force and stick a little better on the more sweeping turns of road courses. Andy was not optimistic about their changes at Mid-Ohio because to the loss of power and the added weight they may have to carry. We'll know more after practice and qualifying.

Practice and Qualifying for GT is mid afternoon today with qualifying Saturday morning. Race 1 is Saturday afternoon with Race 2 on Sunday.

 

[Tuna]

Practice has started for the GT cars and it's looking like the GT3 R cars still have the advantage. With 15 minutes to go, Andy is 6th fastest and Johnny is 9th.
Both are 1.3 or more seconds off the pace of Lazzaro's Ferrari.

 

[Tuna]

Well, practice for the GT/GT-A/GTS group is over and Lazzaro was quickest in a Ferrari followed by a Porsche and a McLaren.
Johnny and Andy were 8th and 9th fastest and over a second off the pace. It's going to be a long weekend for Cadillac Racing.
Qualifying is Saturday morning.

 

[Tuna]

Spoiler Alert.

Qualifying went about like practice with Johnny and Andy qualifying 7th and 9th.

Race 1 turned out a little different as it started raining making the track wet for the race.

Johnny make a great start and went from 7th to 2nd before a big wreck brought out the yellow. Few laps later, the race restarted but the rain got heavier. Another yellow and Johnny pitted for rain tires, along with a few others. That was a good move.

Race 1 was called early as the rain got much worse. Johnny was credited with 2nd. Andy is listed as 7th. This is still preliminary. Official results will follow later.

 

[Tuna]

Spoiler Alert: Race 2

In Race 2, they start according to fast lap times in Race 1.Johnny started 4th and Andy started 10th.Johnny got another great start and was in second before lap 1 ended. Andy did even better moving up from 10th to 5th. Both held those positions for several laps before the faster GT3 cars started getting by them. Johnny was pushed back to 5th place at the finish with Andy finishing a couple of seconds behind Johnny in 6th.

 

[sschooley]

Thanks for the play by play ……
Couldn't make it this again this year and only found the Indy Cars on TV.

Much Appreciated!

Steve