No. 31 Corvette DP Leads 1-2 Sweep At Road America For Action Express, Cameron, Curran Score Second

Dane Cameron took the lead near the halfway point and never looked back Sunday at Road America, joining Eric Curran in winning the Continental Tire Road Race Showcase. It was the second TUDOR United SportsCar Championship victory of the season for the No. 31 Whelen Engineering/Team Fox Corvette started by Eric Curran, leading a 1-2 finish for Action Express Racing.

Cameron beat teammate Joao Barbosa to the checkered flag by 14.359 seconds after leading all but three of the final 41 laps on the 4.048-mile circuit. Barbosa joined Christian Fittipaldi in the team’s No. 5 Mustang Sampling Corvette DP.

The finish also dramatically tightened the Prototype championship race with only two races remaining. Richard Westbrook and Michael Valiante took fifth in the No. 90 VisitFlorida.com Racing Corvette DP. Unofficially, their lead was cut to one point over Barbosa and Fittipaldi, 248-247, with Curran and Cameron another point behind.

It was a flawless performance for the No. 31 team, while various problems struck others in the Prototype field. The pole-winning No. 01 Ford EcoBoost/Riley DP of Joey Hand lost more than a minute during its first pit stop during the lone full-course caution period of the two-hour, 40-minute race, after a clamp came loose on the turbocharger. Scott Pruett was unable to significantly cut the deficit during the final two-hours, three minutes of green flag running, despite running the fastest lap of the race. He finished third, 25.140 second behind at the checkered flag.

Junqueira Passes Daly On Final Lap, Wins PC With Cumming For RSR Racing

Bruno Junqueira passed a spinning Connor Daly on the final lap, giving RSR Racing its second Prototype Challenge (PC) victory of the season in the No. 11 AutoMaxUSA ORECA FLM09 started by Chris Cumming.

Daly recovered to finish second, giving Performance Tech Motorsports its best finish of the season for the No. 38 Ric-Man Construction/GO-PUCK/Braille Batteries ORECA FLM09. James French – a native of nearby Sheboygan, Wis. – won his third TOTAL Pole Award and led twice for 14 laps. Daly took the lead on Junqueira’s final pit stop and led 18 laps through the final circuit.

Colin Braun and Jon Bennett finished third in the No. 54 CORE autosport Flex Box/Composite Resources entry, one position ahead of championship rivals Mike Guasch and Tom Kimber-Smith in the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Cuttwood car. That added two points to the lead, with Bennett and Braun now ahead by five points, 253-248, with two races remaining.

· Cameron became the leading winner in the brief history of the TUDOR Championship with seven victories – coming off a GT Daytona (GTD) triumph in the most recent race at Lime Rock Park. He also was a GTD winner at Road America last year for Turner Motorsport, while Curran won overall in the 2014 Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge race at the circuit.

· The No. 60 Michael Shank Racing with Curb/Agajanian U.S. AutoForce Ligier JS P2/Honda started the race on pit road and served a drive-through penalty on the opening lap due to missing the grid. Ozz Negri smelled fuel while waiting on the false grid to begin warmups, and the team discovered an issue with the fuel cell. John Pew was able to remain on the lead lap despite the penalty. Negri took over during the caution period and went on to finish fourth.

· The No. 10 Konica Minolta Corvette DP offered Action Express Racing its stiffest competition for much of the race. Ricky Taylor led 20 laps before his pit stop. Jordan Taylor kept the car in contention until his final stop, when the team discovered a problem with the left-rear suspension that cost them two laps – resulting in an eighth-place finish.

· The No. 0 Claro/TracFone DeltaWing DWC13 of Memo Rojas and Katherine Legge finished sixth, recording their best finish of the season. The team remained on the lead lap for most of the event before stalling on pit road.

· The next race for the Prototype and PC competitors will be the Lone Star Le Mans at Austin’s Circuit of The Americas on Saturday, Sept. 19.

QUOTES

Dane Cameron – No. 31 Whelen Engineering/Team Fox Corvette DP

“I’m not really sure what happened to everyone else – we stayed focused on our own race. You have to be perfect to win races in the IMSA Prototype category; the competition level is incredibly high. I think we were actually really perfect, and you can’t ask for anything better.”

Scott Pruett – No. 01 Ford EcoBoost/Riley DP

“We knew we had a great car this weekend. Unfortunately, we had a line come undone on the left-side boost system, and we had to fix it. We lost significant power. The yellow came out at the right time for us so we could fix it. Unfortunately, we had no more yellows, so I think even getting back to third was a pretty solid day for how back we were.”

Bruno Junqueira – No. 11 RSR Racing AutoMaxUSA ORECA FLM09

“Man, I gave it 100 percent. Both cars were on old tires, and I took all the risks. I really wanted to win it bad. I love this track, and it was great to win for the RSR team and for Chris. We tested for the first time this year on Tuesday and the car was good. I pushed hard. We had brake problems at the end, but I was able to win. The last lap, I just took all the risks to catch him.”

Conor Daly – No. 38 Ric-Man Construction/GO-PUCK/Braille Batteries ORECA FLM09

“For some reason, [a GTD car] decided to not let us by, even though we were in the lead of the class. I know it’s not their job to let us by, but that’s what killed us. I caught him in the worst part of the track – The Carrousel. I got him on the exit, but Bruno was already behind me and he had more power than me on the straights. I went to defend in the hairpin, but the rears locked really badly and that was it – I couldn’t save it. Pretty devastating.”

Contact:

nsiebens@imsa.com

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