IMSA: Taylors win Long Beach, Corvette GT thwarted

Wayne Taylor Racing took its second consecutive win on the streets of Long Beach as IMSA's WeatherTech SportsCar Championship put on a stellar race until stupidity reared its head with the checkered flag in sight.

The first 90 minutes of the BUBBA burger Sports Car Grand Prix at Long Beach provided fantastic racing, but the quality of the event – and the standard of driving by some – took a dire turn downward during the last 10 minutes.

Ricky and Jordan Taylor led home a Corvette DP sweep of the podium with their No. 10 Konica/Minolta car, and Misha Goikhberg and Stephen Simpson added to their Rolex 24 at Daytona PC class win with first place in the No. 85 PC JDC-Miller Motorsports Oreca FLM09-Chevrolet.

"We always perform really well here and it's a Corvette 1-2-3, so it's a great day for Chevy," said Ricky Taylor, who commanded the race with his brother Jordan. The pole-sitting No. 5 Action Express Racing team and the sister No. 31 AXR car completed the 1-2-3.

And then there was GT Le Mans.

The No. 911 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR driven by Nick Tandy and Patrick Pilet were handed the GTLM win after teammate Fred Makowiecki, driving the No. 912 entry, cheated Corvette Racing's Tommy Milner out of the win by hitting and spinning the No. 4 C7.R in the Turn 11 hairpin with two minutes remaining.

Whether Makowiecki's half-hearted move was phenomenally stupid or intentionally underhanded, the end result left the Corvette parked backward and blocked, and gave Tandy a clear lane to motor by and inherit the win. Once Milner was able to get moving, he took a distant second as the driver of the No. 912 was summoned to the pits by IMSA to pay for his sins. Risi Competizione's No. 62 Ferrari 488 with Giancarlo Fisichella and Toni Vilander at the controls was promoted to third after the No. 912's penalty.

Prior to Makowiecki's theft, Milner and co-driver Oliver Gavin were on target to earn their third consecutive win of the season after capturing Daytona and the 12 Hours of Sebring.

"I just got wrecked, basically," Milner said. "Two Porsches running nose to tail. It is pretty clear what happened there. It is pretty disappointing that is the kind of racing here where we are better than that for sure. At the end of the day, it could have been worse for us for sure. Second place is obviously great points. Disappointing but certainly could have been a lot worse.

"I don't mind finishing second if it is clean and it is the right way, but that wasn't the right way. It hurts a little bit to be second the way it happened, but again, end of the day second place is good points for us. We can hold our heads high that we raced as hard as we could today, the right way."

On the PC front, Goikhberg was elated after watching his teammate steer the yellow No. 85 into Victory Lane. "It feels amazing; it's definitely a long journey for us," he said after the Minnesota-based team put its stamp of authority on the PC class. "We're going to celebrate and think about the next race at Laguna. Lots of BUBBA burgers!"

The No. 8 Starworks PC and the No. 38 Performance Tech Motorsports PC completed the podium, although the No. 38 was badly damaged in a crash on the final lap. Driver Kyle Marcelli was evaluated and released from the infield care center after a hard meeting with the Turn 7 barriers ripped a significant portion of the ORECA FLM09 from its mountings.

RIGHT: Polesitter Fittipaldi's lead didn't last long. (LAT photo)

The race opened with a bold move by Ricky Taylor who barged his way inside Christian Fittipaldi to take the lead into Turn 1, and it only took a few tours of the street course before Tom Long made the second strong move to displace Fittipaldi from second with his No. 70 Mazda Prototype. Both Mazdas had serious pace at Long Beach and slotted in directly behind the Corvette trio at the finish as Joel Miller drove the No. 70 to fourth and Jonathan Bomarito wheeled the No. 55 to fifth.

IndyCar star and part-time VisitFlorida Racing Corvette DP driver Ryan Hunter-Reay, who was pulling double duty this weekend, and teammate Marc Goossens were more than 30 seconds back in sixth.

Flat tires, crashes, pit lane speeding penalties and flailing bodywork added extra drama to GTLM. BMW's pole position with Bill Auberlen in the No. 25 M6 turned into a fifth-place position, the Porsche duo received matching drive-throughs, the No. 67 Ford raced with its left door unlocked and flapping in the wind prior to pitting for repairs, the No. 4 Corvette had a puncture that jeopardized its race, the sister No. 3 Corvette was spun by Antonio Garcia while the factory team was holding a 1-2 in the latter stages of the race, the No. 68 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488 ran slowly before stopping early in the race, and John Edwards had a wheel come off the No. 100 BMW M6 that send him spinning into the tire barriers at a high rate of speed. All of those incidents happened before the Corvette and Porsche contretemps in the hairpin...

The PC class was relatively clean on Saturday prior to Marcelli's big shunt. Colin Braun's stalled CORE autosport car required a caution period at half-distance to remove it from the front straight, but as a whole, the only Pro-Am class in the race showed the manufacturer-rich GTLM drivers how to compete hard while keeping the contact to a minimum.

The BUBBA burger Sports Car Grand Prix at Long Beach will likely be remembered for Makowiecki's successful use of the chrome horn, but if we're focusing solely on those who drove with pride, the Taylor brothers deserve nothing but praise for a flawless performance from start to finish.