No. 14 Dallara takes first VSCA win at Mosport
The No. 84 Porsche 911 GT3 R with drivers Manuel Mayer and Jay Van Meppelen also had a successful day at the Bowmanville, Ontario track and finished in fifth place in the GT3 category.
Leading the headlines, however, was the No. 14 Dallara P217 team with Pedersen and Koopmans. After narrowly missing pole position with a lap time of 1:05.754, just 0.188 seconds slower than the pole setter, Niclas Pedersen had a good start to the race at first, maintaining second position.
On lap 24 however, the Aarhus, Denmark driver slipped off the racing line and into the grass in turn two, as many other cars did on a day with exceptionally hot track temperatures.
Pedersen was able to slow the car but could not avoid contact with the tire barriers. Miraculously, the car did not sustain major damage and the team was able to continue but dropped from second to tenth place.
Ten laps later, the No. 14 Dallara made its first pit stop and Pedersen stayed in the race car. On lap 57 the 26-year-old posted his fastest lap of the race and by lap 68 retook second place in the race, after rallying back to the front.
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© 2022 VSCAracing.com / Benjamin Fischer
David Koopmans held off a hard charge by World of SimRacing Team to claim victory in a photo finish
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The first and only full-course yellow of the race came 53 minutes into the event, and even though the team decided to make a pit stop for fuel and tires and some repairs, Pedersen remained in the car. On the restart Pedersen was in seventh position, but only two laps later he was already in third position.
Team-mate David Koopmans took over as driver on lap 80 when the No. 14 Dallara team made its lone driver swap pit stop of the day. On lap 98 Koopmans made a brilliant pass for position and took over second place.
On lap 101, just about thirty minutes before the finish, the race leader was involved in a crash with another P2 Prototype in the second-to-last corner, giving the No. 14 Dallara team the lead.
Koopmans maintained the lead through the end of the race, albeit a hard-charging P2 Prototype by World of SimRacing in second place behind, that came within 0.076 seconds of Koopmans in a photo finish. But in the end the No. 14 Dallara team prevailed and earned the first ever VSCA victory for Fischer Motorsport.
“Man, this sure feels sweet. What a fantastic race. After our problem early on, when Niclas went off in turn two, I didn’t expect us to come back. But Niclas drove his butt off and got us back near the front.”, Koopmans said after the race.
“I’m just super happy, this was a tough race. It got close there at the end, with traffic holding us up a bit. But David did a great job holding everybody off and getting us that win.”, said Pedersen about the race.
Both Porsche GT3 with strong race, but No. 85 Porsche falters after late incident
In GT3, both Fischer Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R had a strong race, but only the No. 84 Porsche with Manuel Mayer and Jay Van Meppelen were able to reward themselves with a good finish, taking fifth place.
The race wasn’t easy though. Just over one hour into the race and two laps after the restart, Van Meppelen got bumped into famous turn five of Mosport, by another GT3 competitor and consequently spun around. While the car sustained no damage, the team still lost a lot of time and dropped from P4 to P15.
“That was frustrating on multiple levels, because we just had the caution and felt like we were in a very good position at the restart. But it is what it is, I guess.”, Van Meppelen commented on the incident.
The Canadian, putting on a show for the local crowd in the stands, rallied back to P8 by the time the No. 84 Porsche made its lone driver swap pit stop with just under one hour remaining in the race.
It was then Manuel Mayer climbing behind the wheel of the No. 84 Porsche, determined to continue the rally put forth by his team-mate. But with no more full-course yellows coming out in the remainder of the race, the opportunities were limited as the field had. Mayer picked up two more positions to move into sixth position by the time of the race’s conclusion.
After a post-race penalty to another GT3 competitor, the team was officially scored P5 in the end.
For Stephen Nobes and David Leman and the No. 85 Porsche team, things looked very promising for long periods of the race. The team was running in P5 just about thirty minutes before the end of the race.
Unlike most other GT3 teams, the No. 85 Porsche team decided to make two driver changes in the 2-hour-40-minute-long race and on lap 93 Stephen Nobes took over from Leman again to bring the race home.
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© 2022 VSCAracing.com / Benjamin Fischer
Slight contact with the spun car of Resolve Racing in turn five, 13 minutes before the finish, proved costly for the No. 85 Porsche team, who found up 13th
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The driver swap dropped the team to seventh position in GT3, but now running on fresh tires and the hope of another caution before the race’s conclusion.
The gamble did not pay off for the team, though as no further caution period interrupted the race. Running in eighth position on lap 106, just about 13 minutes before the finish, a lapped GT3 competitor in front of Nobes lost control on the exit of turn five, Nobes had nowhere to go and hit the car.
Even though the contact was minimal, the Porsche 911 GT3 R sustained damage on the right rear suspension, forcing the Briton to bring the car back to the pits for repairs. Despite the best efforts of the pit crew, who fixed the suspension in just two minutes, the No. 85 Porsche dropped two laps down to P13.
Nobes was able to pick up one more position in the final stages of the race, but ultimately the No. 85 Porsche team was faced with bitter disappointment.
“We had very good pace today. I wish I could have had more time in the seat today, honestly. But we decided to run a different strategy, make two driver swap stops. And the incident just before the end, it was just one of those things. We were at the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s very disappointing.”, said David Leman, for whom Mosport was the home race of the year.
“I honestly don’t know what I could have done. The other car in front of us lost it and spun awkwardly. I thought he’d slide over to the right, but then he just blocked the middle of the track and all I could do was slow. But then his nose turned around and hit us in the right rear and broke the suspension, apparently. It’s extremely tough luck again.”, said Nobes.
For the No. 85 Porsche it was especially disappointing, after the team had suffered a DNF due to a crash at Watkins Glen last month. Leaving Mosport, the team has to move its hopes to a bounce-back at Road America for Round 7 of the 2022 VSCA SportsCar Championship on August 13th.
In the championship standings, thanks to its victory, the No .14 Dallara P217 now sits in fourth place in the P2 Prototype class, 220 points behind, with an outside shot for the overall championship with two races remaining.
The No. 84 Porsche is third in the GT3 championship, 500 points behind while the No. 85 Porsche is 21st.
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