IMSA: Taylor brothers, Corvette DP win wild race at Belle Isle

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The battle for Motown honors among two of the Big 3 fell in favor of General Motors as Wayne Taylor Racing's Jordan and Ricky Taylor pushed their No. 10 Corvette DP to a slim 0.207-second victory over Richard Westbrook in the pole-sitting No. 90 Spirit of Daytona Corvette DP. The Corvette 1-2 came at ​the aptly titled Chevrolet Sports Car Classic presented by Metro Detroit Chevy Dealers.

Corvette DP stablemate Joao Barbosa nearly stole the win with one lap to go as he tried to pass Ricky Taylor and held the inside line rounding Turn 4 – leading Taylor, who refused to cede the position, to stay tight around the outside of the corner and made contact with the wall on the exit. Surprisingly, it was Barbosa who suffered the worst damage as the Corvettes clashed, blowing a left rear tire and spinning on entry to Turn 7.

With Barbosa out of the way, Oak Racing's Olivier Pla inherited a distant third. Ford's pair of EcoBoost turbo DPs were never in contention, with points-leading Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates forced to pit with clutch troubles within minutes of the start, while an extra pit stop left the Michael Shank Racing down in fourth.

Ryan Dalziel in the No. 1 Extreme Speed Motorsports HPD ARX-03b P2 completed the top-5, 17.7 seconds behind Taylor.

"This was a whole team effort," said Ricky Taylor, whose WTR team scored its second consecutive win at Detroit. "The last couple of laps it was tooth and nail. I was giving it everything I got. When [Barbosa] put us in the wall, I thought he was either going to cut a tire down or we were going to break something...."

Taylor put the hammer down on the final restart, gapping Barbosa by a full two seconds on one lap, but his aggressive start wore down his rear tires prematurely. Losing grip under acceleration, Taylor spent the final laps in defensive mode, allowing Barbosa to draw down the gap and make a diving pass for the lead. Contact would ruin Barbosa's race, and as Taylor told RACER, those early laps set the stage for the dramatic conclusion to Round 5.

"I really thought those last 15 or 20 laps would go by faster, but they didn't," he said with a grin. "I pushed really hard to open up a lead and that ended up hurting me later and I had to drive defensively; I couldn't get off the corners as well as Barbosa and eventually he got a run on me. Our [left rear] wishbone was bent really badly when I hit the wall and I don't know if I could have held onto it for another lap."​

The GT Daytona portion of the 100-minute race delivered non-stop action as the pole-sitting No. 45 Flying Lizard Motorsports Audi R8 of Nelson Canache held the point with a gang of cars in pursuit. A rocket-fast pit stop by Scuderia Corsa saw the No. 63 Ferrari F458 piloted by Jeff Westphal hand the car over to co-driver Alessandro Balzan, who left with the lead and never looked back.

Despite intense pressure, the Italian never wavered. The same couldn't be said of those immediately behind him.

Spencer Pumpelly looked like he had at least a second-place finish in the works, yet lost track position in an unsuccessful passing attempt on Balzan and soon ended up in the tires and parked on the inside of Turn 1 on the final lap. Alex Job Racing's Mario Farnbacher took the No. 23 Porsche 911 GT America to a fine second after out-dragging Pumpelly after the ill-fated pass he tried on the Ferrari, and Paul Miller Racing's Christopher Haase completed the top-3 in his No. 48 Audi R8.

"It feels so good, said Westphal, who helped the 2013 Grand-Am Rolex GT champions to break through into Victory Lane after a tumultuous open to the TUDOR Championship. "We came so close last year. This victory is huge for us – the first of the year."

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