IMSA Mid-Ohio: Wayne Taylor Racing Acura beats dominant Mazda

Acura, which has a dozen different manufacturing and R&D facilities in Ohio, has now won all four races since IMSA’s return to the parkland venue in 2018.

The WTR team prevailed by just 0.368s over the Action Express Cadillac DPi V.R of all-Brazilian pairing Pipo Derani and Felipe Nasr, while Britons Harry Tincknell and Oliver Jarvis had to settle for third place in their Mazda RT24-P despite qualifying on pole and dominating much of the two-hour-and-40-minute race.

After struggling for pace during practice on Friday, the Multimatic/Mazda team made wholesale setup changes – “we threw the kitchen sink at it,” said Multimatic’s Larry Holt – which transformed the handling and enabled Tincknell to establish a blistering new track record in qualifying on Saturday.

Albuquerque, on his very first visit to the technical and challenging 2.258-mile track, started second, less than a tenth of a second adrift of the pole time, but was soon left gasping in Tincknell’s wake on raceday.

The gap grew to over 12 seconds before the first round of pit stops with 40 minutes on the clock, after which Derani/Nasr emerged in second having been the first of the prototype contenders to make their first stop. Tincknell extended his lead even further before making his second stop at the halfway point in the race and handing over the car to Jarvis.

Unfortunately, the Mazda duo’s fine work was undone when the caution flags flew for the first and only time with about an hour remaining. The timing ensured that everyone would be working hard to minimise their fuel consumption when the green flags flew again with 45 minutes remaining.

Crucially, the Albuquerque/Taylor Acura had stretched its fuel load the furthest, so required a shorter fill than the Mazda and was able to leapfrog into second place behind Nasr, who took full advantage of having been called into the pits for service moments before the caution flags flew.

#55 Mazda Motorsports Mazda DPi: Oliver Jarvis, Harry Tincknell

Photo by: Sam Cobb / Motorsport Images

It was Nasr who led at the restart, on a track which offers precious few overtaking opportunities, but Taylor dug deep and pulled off a brilliant and decisive pass immediately after the restart. Taylor then managed to conserve his fuel and squeak home just 0.368 sec ahead of Nasr. The Mazda also managed to stretch its fuel load to the finish line to maintain its streak of three podium finishes to begin the season.

Their second win of the young season allowed Daytona 24 Hours victors Taylor/Albuquerque to extend their points lead over Tincknell/Jarvis from five points to 55.

Gar Robinson earned a second LMP3 class win of the season for Riley Motorsports, joined on this occasion by Brazilian Felipe Fraga.

In GTD, Englishman Jack Hawksworth looked set to score a second successive Mid-Ohio triumph for himself and pole-winning teammate Aaron Telitz, only for their Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 to suffer a suspension failure after 50 laps. Their misfortune allowed veteran Bill Auberlen and Robby Foley to take the spoils aboard their Turner Motorsport BMW M6 GT3.

Results

Cla	Class	Driver	Chassis	Laps	Gap
1	DPi	Ricky Taylor Filipe Albuquerque	Acura DPi	122
2	DPi	Felipe Nasr Pipo Derani	Cadillac DPi	122	0.368
3	DPi	Oliver Jarvis Harry Tincknell	Mazda DPi	122	12.925
4	DPi	Tristan Vautier Loic Duval	Cadillac DPi	122	26.719
5	DPi	Renger van der Zande Kevin Magnussen	Cadillac DPi	122	33.115
6	DPi	Dane Cameron Olivier Pla	Acura DPi	122	37.698
7	LMP3	Gar Robinson Felipe Fraga	Ligier JS P320	115	7 Laps
8	LMP3	Rasmus Lindh Dan Goldburg	Ligier JS P320	115	7 Laps
9	LMP3	Jim Cox Dylan Murry	Ligier JS P320	115	7 Laps
10	LMP3	Jon Bennett Colin Braun	Ligier JS P320	115	7 Laps
11	LMP3	Lance Willsey Joao Barbosa	Ligier JS P320	114	8 Laps
12	GTD	Bill Auberlen Robby Foley	BMW M6 GT3	111	11 Laps
13	GTD	Frankie Montecalvo Zach Veach	Lexus RC F GT3	111	11 Laps
14	GTD	Bryan Sellers Madison Snow	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	111	11 Laps
15	GTD	Roman De Angelis Ross Gunn	Aston Martin Vantage GT3	111	11 Laps
16	GTD	Jeff Kingsley Mario Farnbacher	Acura NSX GT3	111	11 Laps
17	GTD	Zacharie Robichon Laurens Vanthoor	Porsche 911 GT3 R	111	11 Laps
18	GTD	Richard Heistand Jeff Westphal	Audi R8 LMS GT3	111	11 Laps
19	GTD	Till Bechtolsheimer Marc Miller	Acura NSX GT3	111	11 Laps
20	GTD	John Potter Andy Lally	Acura NSX GT3	111	11 Laps
21	GTD	Daniel Morad Michael de Quesada	Mercedes-AMG GT3	111	11 Laps
22	GTD	Rob Ferriol Katherine Legge	Porsche 911 GT3 R	110	12 Laps
23	GTD	Ryan Hardwick Patrick Long	Porsche 911 GT3 R	107	15 Laps
24	LMP3	Jarett Andretti Oliver Askew	Ligier JS P320	85	37 Laps
25	GTD	Aaron Telitz Jack Hawksworth	Lexus RC F GT3	77	45 Laps
View full results