Sweet Redemption For Benitez

Subtitle:Series Veteran Wins First Start Of Season At Watkins Glen

Angel Benitez Jr. closed the deal this year at Watkins Glen.

Venezuela native Benitez, a Miami resident, won Round 5 of the Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama in his first start of the season in the series in the No. 05 JDX Racing Porsche. He held off Jesse Lazare by .521 of a second at the finish.

Benitez won a round of the International Motor Sports Association (IMSA)-sanctioned Single-Make Series in 2013 at Watkins Glen but suffered two heartbreaking defeats last year at the historic 11-turn, 3.4-mile circuit. He lost the lead on the final lap of both rounds to eventual series champion Colin Thompson.

But this year Benitez resisted intense pressure from Lazare’s No. 21 Kelly-Moss Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car over the closing laps to earn the victory.

Benitez has been a standout in the series since 2012, winning the 2012 Gold Cup championship and finishing third in the 2013 Platinum Cup standings with five victories and second in the 2014 standings with a series-high five victories.

“Coming back from eight months, I haven’t tried a Porsche since the last race (of the 2014 season) at Road Atlanta,” Benitez said. “So it took me a while in the first practice session to get used to the car, and it’s awesome to come back to the series and start with a victory. We are more than happy, and I am so glad to represent Hertz and JDX. Thanks to them for giving me the opportunity to come back here.”

Championship leader Elliott Skeer, from Carlsbad, California, finished third in the No. 14 Wright Motorsports Porsche. His lead over Lazare was trimmed to just two points, 72-70.

Santiago Creel, from Mexico City, tied his season-best finish of fourth in the No. 60 Wright Motorsports entry. Kasey Kuhlman, from Cincinnati, rounded out the top five in the No. 15 Wright Motorsports Porsche and was the top Platinum Masters finisher.

Michael Levitas, from Baltimore, won the Gold Cup class and was the top Gold Masters finisher in the No. 36 TPC Racing Porsche.

Round 6 is scheduled to start at 9:10 a.m. (ET) Saturday. Round 4, rescheduled due to heavy rain in April at NOLA Motorsports Park, is scheduled to start at 6:50 p.m. Saturday. Both races are 45 minutes.

Benitez started second but wasted little time moving to the front. He passed pole sitter Skeer with an outside move in Turn 1 on the first lap.

Lazare, from Montreal, passed Skeer for second in Turn 1 with six minutes remaining in the 45-minute race. Then he turned his attention to Benitez, who led by .741 of a second with four minutes, 30 seconds left.

Benitez’s lead was sliced to .456 of a second at the white flag. With one lap to go, memories revived of the last-lap drama from both rounds last year.

But this year was no nightmare for Benitez. He padded the gap over Lazare by nearly a tenth of a second during the final trip around the fast, flowing circuit in the picturesque Finger Lakes region of upstate New York.

Skeer ended up 1.143 seconds behind winner Benitez but was content with another healthy points haul.

“Good points day is how I choose to look at it,” Skeer said. “Angel ran great. Solid from the get-go. Jesse was right there the whole race and obviously nicked me in the end. There’s some things that we can work on, and we are still learning some setup things. It’s my first time here, so I am still kind of learning the way around here and the long distance.”

Platinum Masters

Reigning Platinum Masters class champion Kuhlman powered away from the Platinum Masters field for his third victory in four starts this season, expanding his class lead to 26 points over Bill Peluchiwski.

Kuhlman, who started fifth, rebounded from sinking in the running order at the start.

“I thought I had a good start, and the next thing I know I dropped four spots,” Kuhlman said. “So I was frustrated right off the bat. But I just had to put my head down and have a good clean run, which is what I did. Guys made some mistakes ahead of me, and I took advantage of those and kept the tires on the car. My goal is always the top five. I’m first Master, P5 finish; I will take that anytime.

“I just want to congratulate my teammate Santiago Creel, who beat me for the first time this year, finishing P4. I have to buy him dinner tonight here.”

David Baker, from Colleyville, Texas, earned his first podium finish of the season in the No. 56 TOPP Racing Porsche. He also earned the Yokohama Hard Charger Award, finishing 10th overall after starting 18th.

Peluchiwski, from Chicago, also earned his first podium finish of the season by placing third in the No. 74 Kelly-Moss Motorsports entry.

Gold Cup/Gold Masters

Levitas continued his mastery of Watkins Glen, earning his third consecutive victory at the track dating back to a sweep of the Gold Cup races here in June 2014.

Levitas started from the Gold Cup pole and never trailed, beating Jeff Mosing to the checkered flag by 4.209 seconds. It was his first victory of the season.

“We had great competition, and this win is for my daughter Erin,” Levitas said. “Erin has met more competition than I have this week, and I have met some of the best competition I’ve had in God knows how many years. Erin, you have just absolutely been my idol, and I look up to your strength and your determination and you are just number one for me. My daughter has been battling cancer, and she’s just a trooper and she’s pulling through it.”

Mosing, from Austin, Texas, fortified his Gold Cup points lead with his fourth consecutive top-two finish of the season in the No. 01 TOPP Racing Porsche. He leads Wayne Ducote, 74-53, in the standings.

David Ducote, from Houston, placed third in the No. 6 Kelly-Moss Motorsports Porsche. His second consecutive podium finish vaulted him to third in the standings, just three points behind his father, Wayne Ducote.

All three Gold Cup podium finishers are also Gold Masters competitors.

Up Next

Round 6 is scheduled to start at 9:10 a.m. (ET) Saturday. Round 4, rescheduled due to heavy rain in April at NOLA Motorsports Park, is scheduled to start at 6:50 p.m. Saturday. Both races are 45 minutes.

For live updates on all the action, follow @IMSALive on Twitter.

ROUND 5 POST-RACE QUOTES:

ANGEL BENITEZ JR. (No. 05 JDX Racing, winner): “This year is completely different, and I have to race the Lamborghini and the Porsche. Coming back from eight months, I haven’t tried a Porsche since the last race (in October) at Road Atlanta. So it took me a while in the first practice session to get used to the car, and it’s awesome to come back to the series and start with a victory. We are more than happy, and I am so glad to represent Hertz and JDX. Thanks to them for giving me the opportunity to come back here. We have a rough year ahead, two races already behind us, but we are going to do our best and show people that we are fast and we can provide a good show on the track and hope that everyone follows us the whole year to see how it ends.”

JESSE LAZARE (No. 21 Kelly-Moss Motorsports, second): “I feel great, considering we messed up in qualifying. The team gave me a great car to race with, and moving up a spot is amazing. It was a calculated risk, and I did it, and I can’t wait for tomorrow.”

ELLIOTT SKEER (No. 14 Wright Motorsports, third): “Good points day is how I choose to look at it. Angel (Benitez) ran great. Solid from the get-go. Jesse (Lazare) was right there the whole race and obviously nicked me in the end. There’s some things that we can work on, and we are still learning some setup things. It’s my first time here, so I am still kind of learning the way around here and the long distance. But if it’s dry tomorrow, I know where we need to go setup-wise, and I know how aggressive I should be. I’m feeling really good for tomorrow, rain or shine.”

KASEY KUHLMAN (No. 15 Wright Motorsports, first Platinum Masters): “I thought I had a good start, and the next thing I know I dropped four spots. So I was frustrated right off the bat. But I just had to put my head down and have a good clean run, which is what I did. Guys made some mistakes ahead of me, and I took advantage of those and kept the tires on the car. My goal is always the top five. I’m first Master, P5 finish; I will take that anytime. I just want to congratulate my teammate Santiago Creel, who beat me for the first time this year, finishing P4. I have to buy him dinner tonight here.” (How were the tires?): “The tires were great. I think I overworked them a little bit trying to catch up to the lead pack, and after I did that I knew I didn’t have what it took to stay with them. So at that point I just needed to stay steady.”

DAVID BAKER (No. 56 TOPP Racing, second Platinum Masters, Yokohama Hard Charger Award winner): “The guys at TOPP Racing worked all night. They are just incredible, and I don’t know how they got my car back together. Twenty seconds to grid closing in qualifying – that’s when my car was ready and my steering wheel was at the 3 o’clock position, but we still qualified and then we ran out of gas. But we had a great start today, and I think that’s the reason we did so well. I had a real good run coming off of Turn 1, going all the way into the Bus Stop, so if anyone was giving me trouble, I took care of them there.”

BILL PELUCHIWSKI (No. 74 Kelly-Moss Motorsports, third Platinum Masters): “It was a really fun race. A lot of battles with multiple cars. It was a lot of fun. I lost some ground on the restart but clawed it back. This is an iconic track, and going up the Esses takes quite a bit of courage, but it’s one of those tracks that stands out from the rest. I had a very good time.”

MICHAEL LEVITAS (No. 36 TPC Racing, winner Gold Cup, Gold Masters): “That race was absolutely fantastic. We had great competition, and this win is for my daughter Erin. Erin has met more competition than I have this week, and I have met some of the best competition I’ve had in God knows how many years. Erin, you have just absolutely been my idol, and I look up to your strength and your determination, and you are just number one for me. My daughter has been battling cancer, and she’s just a trooper and she’s pulling through it. But I have to thank my competitors. They did an awesome job, and if I pulled a half a second under them, they would answer back a little lower and keep chasing me down. My chassis was amazing. DSC Sport/Tractive suspension did an awesome job. They helped me this weekend. I couldn’t have done it without my team, and I am just the nut behind the wheel. But, man, it was fun to drive that car.”

JEFF MOSING (No. 01 TOPP Racing, second Gold Cup, Gold Masters): “Always looking for a good start. Hats off to all the drivers today because we had a clean Turn 1 on Lap 1. So hat’s off to everybody for keeping it safe. The Yokohama tires were great, but I think I could have done a better job of conserving my front tires to be able to give (Michael) Levitas one toward the end, but I just waited too long to dial in rear brake. (Todd) Opperman did a great job setting the car up, and hat’s off to Paul. Thanks to Yokohama for providing such great tires for us in the heat today; they worked really well. I just had a really good time running with (David) Baker. I was really proud of him after having a little incident in practice. He put his head down, and he really put some laps down in front of me, and it was a great job on his part.”

DAVID DUCOTE (No. 6 Kelly-Moss Motorsports, third Gold Cup, Gold Masters): “It was tough. I had to start in the back because I switched tires, but I knew Kelly-Moss had given me a very good car. So I just drove as hard and as fast as I could and chipped away. I picked up I don’t know how many positions overall and finally made it up to third in class, and that’s probably all we can ask for. It was a good result with not too good of a beginning.”

Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama

The Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama enters its 11th season in 2015 as one of the largest of Porsche’s 20 single-make Cup Challenge series in the world. The series produces intense, exciting competition for semi-professional and aspiring professional drivers in the world’s most produced and iconic race car, the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup.

Racing is divided into two classes – Platinum Cup, featuring the 2014 and 2015 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car, which is based on the current seventh, and current, generation of the street car, and Gold Cup, which is comprised of the previous iteration (model years 2010-2013) of the race car. A Masters Championship also is conducted in Platinum and Gold classes. Each class is awarded with its own podium at the end of every race and individual champion at the end of every season. Points are awarded by finish in class.

ABOUT IMSA

The International Motor Sports Association, LLC (IMSA) was originally founded in 1969 with a long and rich history in sports car racing. Today, IMSA is the sanctioning body of the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship, the premier sports car racing series in North America. IMSA also sanctions the Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge and the Cooper Tires Prototype Lites Powered by Mazda, as well as four single-make series: Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama; Ultra 94 Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Canada by Michelin; Ferrari Challenge North America; and Lamborghini Super Trofeo North America. IMSA – a company within the NASCAR Holdings group – is the exclusive strategic partner in North America with the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO), which operates the 24 Hours of Le Mans as a part of the FIA World Endurance Championship. The partnership enables selected TUDOR Championship competitors to earn automatic entries into the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans.