MSR Acura, Corvettes set early Watkins Glen Six Hours pace

Ricky Taylor started from pole position, but it was Dane Cameron in the No. 60 Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-05c who led the field after the opening lap and dominated the first hour of the Sahlen’s Six Hours of Watkins Glen. Cameron confessed to making a few mistakes during his fastest lap in qualifying yesterday but there were no such mistakes on Sunday morning as he held onto a 5.99s lead on Taylor.

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There was early drama for two cars, the No. 8 Tower Motorsports ORECA 07 and the No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Porsche 911 RSR.

The No. 8 ORECA suffered a broken toe link on the run down to the first turn on the first lap of the race. That sent John Farano spinning into the barrier on driver’s left. Repairs were made and the car was sent back out only for it to lose power in the Esses.

At the same time that was happening, a fire began to engulf the left rear of the No. 79 Porsche of Cooper MacNeil. MacNeil had brushed the wall on the exit of the final corner, which seemed to be the cause of the fire.

He brought the car back to the pits and stopped near a gap in the pit wall where mechanics from Performance Tech and Andretti Autosport jumped into action to extinguish the flames. MacNeil was uninjured and jumped out of the car once it came to a stop.

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In GT Le Mans, it was a Corvette Racing 1-2 as the No. 4 Corvette C8.R leads the No. 3 by half a second. The pair of BMW Team RLL entries were about four seconds further behind the pair of Corvettes at the end of the opening hour.

Steven Thomas in the No. 11 WIN Autosport ORECA 07 pulled out a significant early gap on the rest of the LMP2 field, including Ben Keating in the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports ORECA 07. It’s been a great start for Thomas as it’s not every day that a fellow amateur driver pulls away from Keating with ease. Thomas leads Keating by just over one minute.

Trent Hindman moved the No. 16 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R into the lead of the race on the first restart after passing the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC-F GT3 in Turn 1. The No. 14 Lexus remains in second ahead of its teammate in the No. 12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC-F GT3 who sit third.

In LMP3 it’s been Austin McCusker in the No. 2 United Autosports USA Ligier JS P320 and Jarett Andretti in the No. 36 Andretti Autosport Ligier JS P320 who have been the class of the field early on in LMP3. McCusker led Andretti by 9.743s after the first hour.