Win some - lose some for the two ad-hoc AMR runners in GT Americas visit to Long Beach
Monday, April 14, 2025
Speaking with Max Hewitt, he confirmed that Long Beach was never upon his agenda with that venue being a street-based circuit in his first full season of GT4 racing and much was probably the case for Prosport Competition GT4 runner Tim Savage as well.
That left both AMR Vantage GT3 (SRO3) entries from both the Heart of Racing and Racers Edge stables for their bronze rated side of their GTWCAm side of things for drivers Gray Newell and Jason Bell respectively, as both drivers looked for more credible seat time within the cars ahead of their next round from CoTA.
Well, at least that was the plan as an early banker qualifying lap for race one from Newell ended up being the pole position time within a red flag affected fifteen-minute qualifying session. That saw the young man gain his first ever GT3 based pole position within his #24 car whilst Bell was scored P13 within his #2 car.
However, Bell would not start the opening forty-minute race with a clutch issue leaving Newell to fend for himself around the streets of Los Angeles as the lights went green for the first time. Losing early ground to race veteran Sofronas within his Audi. Defending hard after that, Newell maintained his P2 position for much of the race before being passed by the #29 BMW at the halfway point.
After that, Newell was able to keep hold of the final podium position despite having to deal with GT4 traffic and chasing Porsches for what we thought to be the final uneventful minutes of the race, but racing is never over till its over. Despite losing P3 to the chasing Porsche, an issue with the race leading Audi saw that car stop on track just yards away from the finish line for Newell to recover a P3 finishing position after all.
Race 2 would start according to fastest laps posted within race one which would mean a P6 start for Newell and P14 for Bell who would this time take the start but a mistake from Newell at the water fountain for the first time saw his car mount the kerb, hit the side of the Corvette to spin around to nose into the shrubbery of the water feature.
Whilst he got going again, he was still only one GT3 car place behind the #2 car of Bell who was running P12 at the time but both Astons would be forced to visit pit lane for damage at the end of the opening lap and whilst both would come back out, they had already dropped a lap to the leaders.
A further visit to pit lane for Bell would compound a sour return to the series where he won two GT4 driver championships as he would eventually bale from the race with seven minutes still remaining. Despite pushing hard since his visit to pit lane, Newell was unable to recover any ground lost to finish the day P11 overall.
Photo credits – Teams / Series
Photo credits – Teams / Series
