Austin United SportsCar: Ganassi win boosts Pruett/Hand title bid

Both Hand and Pruett led intermittently throughout the race in their Riley DP and ultimately romped home to a comfortable winning margin of 16.910 seconds ahead of Jordan and Ricky Taylor.

Having claimed pole on Friday, Pruett led away at the start - although he only secured his lead on the exit of the first corner, ahead of a fast-starting Michael Valiante.

Jordan Taylor quickly snatched Valiante's second place into the stadium section, but despite staying with Pruett was unable to make a similar move for the lead of the race.

The leading duo stayed together before a caution period ensued, with Pruett and Oswaldo Negri Jr opting to stay out on track, while Taylor and the remainder of the Prototype field headed for the pits.

Despite the two different strategies, Hand retained the overall lead after taking over from Pruett and, even with the intervention of a second safety car, looked set for victory into the final hour of the race.

That was briefly jeopardised within three quarters of an hour of the finish, as Hand, pitting a lap later than Taylor, emerged in third after his team opted to fit new tyres to his car.

But after setting the fastest lap of the race, a 1m58.616s, Hand quickly caught up to Ricky Taylor and Memo Rojas - who had assumed the lead in the DeltaWing by staying out as others pitted - before overtaking both on lap 54.

With fresh rubber fitted, Hand eased away from Taylor after the latter too had overtaken Rojas to retain a mathematical chance of clinching the championship at Road Atlanta in two weeks' time.

Behind the Taylor pair, Rojas had been set to claim a podium for himself and Katherine Legge before a late lock-up and trip through the gravel dropped him down the order.

That allowed championship leaders Richard Westbrook and Valiante to claim the final podium position after Westbrook resisted late pressure from Negri.

The #31 Action Express car of Eric Curran and Dane Cameron had been in contention for victory in the first half of the race, but a drive-through penalty following contact with PC driver Renger van der Zande put pay to their chances as they finished fifth.

The polesitting RSR Racing car of Chris Cumming/Bruno Junqueira and Mikhail Goikhberg/Matt McMurray's JDC/Miller Motorsports ORECA looked the early protagonists for PC class honours, but Colin Braun drove a tremendous second stint for the CORE Autosport team to claim what was ultimately a comfortable victory alongside Jon Bennett.

Matters looked settle in the GTLM class with Nick Tandy leading in the closing stages, but he and Porsche partner Patrick Pilet were forced to pit with just two laps remaining to take fuel, handing honours to the Team RLL BMW Z4 GTE of Bill Auberlen and Dirk Werner.

In the GTD class, Dodge pair Jeroen Bleekemolen and Ben Keating edged out Markus Palttala and his Turner BMW team-mate Michael Marsal after Townsend Bell was forced to serve a drive-through penalty for contact with Prototype driver Joao Barbosa - who in turn was penalised for retaliating - and previous leader Kuno Wittmer pitted.

RESULTS - 73 LAPS: