When the talk of driver standards overshadows the main events on track after IMSAs visit to Road America

 

 

After those six hours that were the IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship’s visit to Road America at the weekend, we certainly needed time to digest exactly what did happen out on track, but whatever it was, it did leave one Aston Martin Racing powered crew with a well-earned podium finish.

Despite the mixed track conditions through Free Practice and into Qualifying didn’t seem to hamper the two AMR Vantage GTD entries from the Heart of Racing and Car Blanche teams as Zacharie Robichon secured a P3 start in that class for his #27 car, but only just ahead of Valentin Hasse-Clot and his #068 entry before a penalty for a car ahead moved them both one car forward. Further forward, Ross Gunn had again qualified the HoRT Aston Martin Valkyrie in eighth ahead of the Sunday afternoon start.

 

Cooler but importantly dry were the track conditions as the new for 2026 six-hour race got underway but with over fifty multi-classed cars upon track, it wasn’t too long before the first casualty came to bear when another GTD was ‘encouraged’ into the wall after contact from a passing GTP and into immediate retirement.

The inevitable start-stop cycle of Full Course Yellow into restart before diving sooner or later into another quickly blighted what should have been a cleaner race than what it had been until that point. By the end of the first hour, Robichon was still at the head at the GTD class whilst Hasse-Clot had already swapped out for Marius Fossard to take his first stint whilst hanging onto fourth. The #23 Valkyrie of Gunn was also hanging on in there around seventh to eighth in GTP.

 

At the two-hour mark both Heart of Racing entries had a driver change as Roman De Angelis took over the #23 Valkyrie with Eduardo Barrichello assuming control of the #27 Vantage after which, both cars slotted back into their previous racing position as two further single car incidents on track slowed things down again to aid their recovery.

The #068 Car Blanche AMR then put Trenton Estep behind the wheel and whilst that combination did slide down the GTD order somewhat, a differing pit and fuel strategy would again see their factory driver (VHC) behind the wheel again very soon whilst the Brazilian, continued to cement the hard early graft of his Canadian team-mate within the #27 car up front.

 

Going into the final seventy minutes or so of the race, the third drivers were mainly aboard as Tom Gamble was tasked with taking the #27 car to the flag with Hasse-Clot getting back into the #068 with as much fuel as his car could carry. Whilst the faster GTP prototypes were mainly squabbling amongst themselves both with contact and technical issues, that saw the #23 Valkyrie slowly lift itself up the order and into the top six for the first time in the race.

A further single car off track set up for a final twenty-five-minute dash to the flag with podium potential looking very plausible for all three Aston Martins. Hasse-Clot had managed to get his car past that of Gamble during the #27 car’s final stop to be running in third whilst the #23 was now up to fifth as the final FCY situation caused by one GTP going off alone before another GTP/GTP contact again set off the chat about driving standards changed everything yet again.

 

Those two incidents had lifted the #23 into P2 overall, with the #068 still in third but with the #27 down in fifth and with only two laps remaining, the hopes of any restart to racing looked slim.

Despite finishing second on track, there would be no trip to the podium for either Gunn or De Angelis as a late Drive Through Penalty (converted post-race into a time Penalty) saw the #23 car drop down the order as incident responsibility was cast their way.

 

Whilst the #068 crew did make it to the GTD podium with their P3 finish in class, the #23 Valkyrie still notched up another best at the circuit by beating their last years result by one but for the #27 car, Road America would become another case of what might have been. Despite leading the class for much of the race, a post-race time penalty of their own saw them tumble to P15 in class.

Photo credits – Teams / social media