Sebring 12H: Bourdais, Duval, Vautier win in JDC-Miller Cadillac

An earlier collision with Jimmie Johnson's #48 AXR Cadillac had helped the JDC-Miller car fall a lap behind in the first half of the race, but after hours of toil, the #5 had managed to return to the lead lap following a caution period.

Mike Conway's #31 AXR Cadillac ground to a halt on track with under two hours to go, prompting all the prototype cars to pit in anticipation of the seventh caution period of the race, and allowing Bourdais in his own Cadillac to return to the lead lap.

The JDC-Miller team then began to swashbuckle its way through its DPi class rivals, clearing Alexander Rossi in the Wayne Taylor Racing Acura - the WTR car had been suffering from an intercooler issue following earlier contact.

Mazda's Oliver Jarvis then pitted to hand over the RT-24P car to Harry Tincknell with just over an hour to go, and that triggered other teams to respond.

One of those was Chip Ganassi Racing, which reportedly made a late call to race leader Scott Dixon to bring him in just after he lapped a GTLM BMW. As Dixon tried to swerve the #01 Cadillac onto pitlane, he was struck hard in the right front corner by the BMW, necessitating steering repairs and a new nose, costing the car three laps.

Thus Bourdais, driving the JDC-Miller Cadillac that had run at least one lap down for the majority of the race zoomed into the lead with little more than hour to go with a seven second lead over Tincknell’s Mazda - which became eight when he made his final stop.

After a final caution period for a GTD crash, Bourdais escaped initially from Tincknell at the restart, but a couple of slow laps left him within striking distance of the Mazda before edging away again.

But Kamui Kobayashi in the #48 had deposed both the Acuras and had moved onto Tincknell’s tail – and occasionally alongside him, relieving the pressure from Bourdais.

Bourdais then crossed the line with 1.4s over Tincknell, claiming a famous victory as Kobayashi was just 0.2s further back having been resisted by Tincknell.

 

With Kobayashi's Cadillac demoted to seventh and last in the DPi class, as AXR caused a drive-time infraction by leaving Simon Pagenaud in the car too long, the Meyer Shank Racing and WTR Acuras were promoted to third and fourth respectively.

The Chip Ganassi Cadillac was left two laps down in fifth after Dixon's earlier incident.

In LMP2, Mikkel Jensen brought the PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Oreca home first ahead of Ryan Dalziel in the Rolex 24-winning Era Motorsport entry.

LMP3 developed into a feisty four-way battle in the dying hours, until the Forty7 Motorsports Duqueine of Oliver Askew suddenly died temporarily, consigning it to fourth.

Remarkably, CORE Autosport, with Colin Braun, George Kurtz and Jon Bennett at the wheel of the team's Ligier, defeated the two Riley Motorsports Ligiers.

Mathieu Jaminet crossed the line first among the GTLM runners to secure victory for the WeatherTech Porsche team, taking advantage of a class lead collision between the #3 Corvette and the #25 RLL BMW.

Garcia, who had led the class for most of the race, had struggled on pace and lost ground to both BMWs and the sole Porsche 911 RSR, but re-took the lead having required less fuel at the at his penultimate stop - while the #24 BMW caught fire due to a fuel spillage as John Edwards switched places with Jesse Krohn.

Although Krohn returned to the circuit, he was a lap down in fourth, as Connor De Phillippi took over the other BMW from Philipp Eng and Matt Campbell tagged out of the Porsche for Jaminet.

However, Jaminet got ahead after the final stops, then lost out to De Phillippi after the final restart, as the BMW started trying to close down Garcia. Having caught up, he nudged into the Corvette at Turn 7, and pushed it wide - both sustaining damage.

De Phillippi recovered with his damaged car, but ran wide at Turn 15 and then had to serve a drive-through penalty.

Thus Jaminet’s Porsche grabbed the lead, the limping Corvette was so slow that De Phillippi reemerged from his penalty still in second and the one-lap down #24 BMW moved up into third.

 

Laurens Vanthoor and Patrick Long completed a Porsche 1-2 finish in the GT Daytona category, as the Pfaff Motorsports team controlled the class expertly.

Zacharie Robichon took over from Vanthoor earlier in the race, after the Belgian had reclaimed the lead from the Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini.

Wright Motorsports' Porsche had tailed Robichon by seven seconds with the final three hours remaining, but had to serve a drive-through penalty with Trent Hindman at the wheel for having one too many pitcrew members over the wall - dropping to sixth.

The GTD cars hit the pitlane during the penultimate caution , the Pfaff Porsche emerging still in front – now driven by Vanthoor once more.

Zach Veach, taking over from Frankie Montecalvo in the Vasser Sullivan Lexus, lost out because he had pitted under green - moments before the yellows. Veach then sprinted away before the drop of the green flag – and then had his rear bumper knocked onto the tyre by an impact from Vanthoor, leaving the ex-IndyCar driver having to pit for repairs and then serve a drive-through penalty.

Vanthoor was not penalised and rocketed away from second-placed Ross Gunn in the Aston Martin Vantage, who was ahead of the Wright Motorsport Porsche now driven by Long.

Long then cleared Gunn, bringing the Wright car back into second place, ahead of a final caution period when the #75 Mercedes-AMG GT3 driven by Maro Engel shed a wheel coming onto the pit straight, spinning and striking the wall.

Vanthoor pulled away from Long at the restart, leaving Gunn in third to secure a Porsche 1-2 finish.

Team Hardpoint's Katherine Legge and Magnus Racing's Andy Lally clashed while fighting over fourth place - Legge was perceived to be at fault and was penalised, dropping to fifth behind Lally's Acura.

Race results:

Cla	Class	Num	Driver	Chassis	Laps	Time
1	DPi	5	Tristan Vautier Loic Duval Sébastien Bourdais	Cadillac DPi	349	12:01'01.418
2	DPi	55	Oliver Jarvis Harry Tincknell Jonathan Bomarito	Mazda DPi	349	12:01'02.853
3	DPi	48	Jimmie Johnson Kamui Kobayashi Simon Pagenaud	Cadillac DPi	349	12:01'03.059
4	DPi	60	Dane Cameron Olivier Pla Juan Pablo Montoya	Acura DPi	349	12:01'04.032
5	DPi	10	Ricky Taylor Filipe Albuquerque Alexander Rossi	Acura DPi	349	12:01'06.736
6	DPi	01	Renger van der Zande Kevin Magnussen Scott Dixon	Cadillac DPi	347	12:01'05.102
7	LMP2	52	Ben Keating Mikkel Jensen Scott Huffaker	ORECA LMP2 07	344	12:01'23.212
8	LMP2	18	Dwight Merriman Kyle Tilley Ryan Dalziel	ORECA LMP2 07	344	12:01'25.799
9	GTLM	79	Cooper MacNeil Mathieu Jaminet Matt Campbell	Porsche 911 RSR - 19	334	12:02'42.220
10	GTLM	25	Connor de Phillippi Philipp Eng Bruno Spengler	BMW M8 GTE	333	12:01'18.541
11	LMP2	22	James McGuire Wayne Boyd Guy Smith	ORECA LMP2 07	333	12:02'14.977
12	GTLM	24	John Edwards Jesse Krohn Augusto Farfus	BMW M8 GTE	333	12:02'43.161
13	GTLM	3	Antonio Garcia Jordan Taylor Nick Catsburg	Corvette C8.R	333	12:02'51.712
14	GTLM	4	Tommy Milner Nick Tandy Alexander Sims	Corvette C8.R	330	12:01'14.546
15	LMP3	54	Jon Bennett George Kurtz Colin Braun	Ligier JS P320	329	12:02'33.175
16	LMP3	91	Jim Cox Dylan Murry Jeroen Bleekemolen	Ligier JS P320	329	12:02'35.860
17	LMP3	74	Gar Robinson Scott Andrews Spencer Pigot	Ligier JS P320	329	12:02'36.376
18	LMP3	7	Jim Norman Oliver Askew Austin McCusker	Duqueine D08	328	12:01'40.493
19	LMP3	33	Joao Barbosa Yann Clairay Lance Willsey	Ligier JS P320	328	12:02'50.163
20	GTD	9	Zacharie Robichon Laurens Vanthoor Lars Kern	Porsche 911 GT3 R	320	12:01'25.556
21	GTD	16	Patrick Long Jan Heylen Trent Hindman	Porsche 911 GT3 R	320	12:01'27.668
22	GTD	23	Ian James Roman De Angelis Ross Gunn	Aston Martin Vantage GT3	320	12:01'48.947
23	GTD	44	John Potter Andy Lally Spencer Pumpelly	Acura NSX GT3	320	12:02'08.207
24	GTD	88	Christina Nielsen Katherine Legge Ana Beatriz	Porsche 911 GT3 R	320	12:02'18.500
25	GTD	12	Frankie Montecalvo Zach Veach Robert Megennis	Lexus RC F GT3	319	12:01'39.225
26	GTD	14	Aaron Telitz Jack Hawksworth Kyle Kirkwood	Lexus RC F GT3	313	12:01'31.478
27	GTD	96	Bill Auberlen Robby Foley Aidan Read	BMW M6 GT3	313	12:01'36.058
28	GTD	75	Kenny Habul Maro Engel Mikael Grenier	Mercedes-AMG GT3	304	11:24'26.045
29	DPi	31	Felipe Nasr Mike Conway Pipo Derani	Cadillac DPi	292	10:04'05.751
30	GTD	99	Rob Ferriol Earl Bamber Trenton Estep	Porsche 911 GT3 R	280	12:01'36.620
31	LMP2	8	John Farano Gabriel Aubry Timothé Buret	ORECA LMP2 07	266	9:14'04.319
32	LMP3	83	Matthew Bell Rodrigo Sales Niklas Kruetten	Duqueine D08	265	10:51'09.230
33	GTD	1	Bryan Sellers Madison Snow Corey Lewis	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	255	9:37'34.679
34	LMP3	38	Rasmus Lindh Mateo Llarena Dan Goldburg	Ligier JS P320	177	6:24'04.063
35	GTD	28	Daniel Morad Michael de Quesada Billy Johnson	Mercedes-AMG GT3	91	3:19'57.664
36	GTD	19	Stephen Simpson Franck Perera Tim Zimmermann	Lamborghini Huracan GT3	91	3:19'57.925
37	LMP2	11	Thomas Steven Tristan Nunez Thomas Merrill	ORECA LMP2 07	90	3:33'28.269
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