Introduction IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach No GTD Pro at Long Beach this year, GTP and GTD only Qualifying Vasser Sullivan front row lockout for GTD 31 AXR Cadillac on pole for GTP after an eventful session → Pipo Derani with the bin it and win it strategy (locked up and got into the tire barriers but still managed to get pole position) Argy Bargy between Bourdais and Rockenfeller Race Good race or no? #12 Vasser Sullivan Lexus gets a penalty for moving out of line before the start Good battle between Porsche, BMW, and Cadillac, BMW continuing their streak on bungled strategy calls (0-3 now) → Ended up leaving Yelloly out too long after everyone else pitted, and then a yellow came out #25 BMW and #6 Porsche trade blows First race where the Mustang GT3s did not have bodywork issues (Insert confetti noise) Race starts out calm, then delves into chaos later: #70 Inception McLaren gets into the wall, then collects the #120 Porsche GTD with it WTR Acura crashes going into turn 1 again (this time it’s the 40!) Felipe Nasr and Connor De Phillippi go at → De Phillippi gets into the back of the #7 Porsche (just a little love tap!) Chaos at the hairpin → #6 Porsche Penske gets spun after contact from a Lambo GTD (Lambo was later penalized for the contact, maybe not necessary), this leads to everyone checking up and causing an extremely silly traffic jam situation #25 gets more damage from the incident → front end damage and rear damage, gets repaired but then ends up in the tire barriers later, officially taking the car out of contention # 01 Cadillac brake checks the #31 01 Cadillac wins in GTP (the strategy of taking no tires worked out for them) #89 Vasser Sullivan wins in GTD IndyCar Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach Pre-Race stuff F2 Champion Theo Pourchaire fills in for David Malukas at Arrow McLaren → Recovery for Malukas taking longer than expected as there are still pins in his arm Qualifying Arrow McLaren disaster class unfortunately → none made it to the final round of qualifying Felix Rosenqvist on pole Race Good race or no? McLaren’s troubles continue Pato gets into the back of Rossi → claims that he got shoved by Blomqvist and that the incident was not his fault (turned out to not be true, and he received a penalty for avoidable contact Rasmussen gets into the wall and collects Harvey with him Penalty for Lundgaard of RLL → unsafe release, caused contact with Kirkwood on pitlane Contact between Newgarden and Herta → racing incident or not? Scott Dixon clinches the win Theo Pourchaire does good for his debut (finished p15 or p16 and earned the “biggest mover” award) Formula Drift at Long Beach First event of the FD US calendar Some driver shuffles Ben Hobson replacing Chelsea Denofa Adam LZ left the Ford RTR program Travis Reeder not running this year Andy Hateley, Derek Madison, and Rudy Hansen up from ProSpec Hiroya Minowa joined FD US (he’s only 14!!!) → won in FD JP last year James Deane barbequed his Mustang in practice New qualifying format Versus single car runs, Top 32 is now seeded by battles Idea is for for fans trackside to get more action Hiroya Minowa qualified P1, Adam LZ P2 OZ1 really catching out a lot of drivers Rain came down part way through Top 32 and didn’t stop Caught out the likes of Ryan Tuerck and Deane Deane v Hurst slugfest in Top 16 → went OMT Both had INC lead runs but fabulous chase runs, forcing the OMT James Deane would win in a Cinderella story after the practice fire Simon Olsen would take P2 and Odi Bakchis P3
