The Stevenson Motorsports charge for three consecutive IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge victories ended at Road America on Saturday after the race was called early following heavy rains and lightning. The team, which won the Watkins Glen and Lime Rock Park rounds in the No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Camaro GT4.R, was classified fourth at the finish with drivers Matt Bell and Robin Liddell.
Starting on Row 4 for the two-hour Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge event at Road America, Bell set his focus on the start, hoping to use momentum to gain position.
The opening stages of the race were textbook close and competitive Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge racing. Bell ran nose to tail with the top seven cars, frequently dicing for position and at one point moving up to third. While there were Porsches, McLarens, and Mustangs all in the mix, it really was the long front straightaway that proved to be the biggest competitor for the No. 57 Camaro GT4.R as it struggled to keep top speed compared to the competition.
But anticipating this would be the case, Bell capitalized on the strengths of his Camaro through the low speed cornering sections which helped him to gain a gap on the competition and allow his nose to stay in the battle.
Midway through his stint Bell had a spectacular save as he and the leading ST car tangled in a braking zone. Bell was pushed off into the damp grass – turning him around. Miraculously Bell returned back on track without losing a single position.
With threatening clouds approaching in the distance, Bell finished out his stint before turning the car over to Liddell on Lap 22.
The pit stop was another performance boost for the team, with quick work helping to gain track position as Liddell returned on track with a fresh set of Continental Tires and full tank of fuel. But his charge to the checkers was abruptly cut off two laps later as the red flag was released for lightning in the area.
After a red flag brought the field into the pits, rain came down heavily with a lightning warning keeping the cars in place until IMSA called the race with 15 minutes remaining with the No. 57 slotted in fourth position.
“We knew going into this race we were going to struggle a little bit with top speed but I didn’t expect it to be that bad,” said Bell. “In order to make up spots we have to be super daring going into corners, in the middle of corners and on exit, but it’s way more risky. The car was performing well and they made the right decision to go back to the set up that we tried during testing. I feel bad for Robin (Liddell) because he didn’t get to drive and you never want that. Robin is a great competitor and he would have been very fast.”
“It was a very exciting race to watch,” said team strategist, Mike Johnson. “The McLarens have a lot of straight-line speed and we have a great cornering car. We expected that back-and-forth during the race. We really needed to get ahead of the McLarens coming out of Turn 5 so that we could get enough of a gap to get around them in the Carousel, but then they would just drive right past us on the straightaway. Matt (Bell) was doing a great job battling and he got stuck in some ST traffic and got pushed off by another guy who didn’t see him. It’s unfortunate that the race had to end the way it did. But, onto the next race.”
“It was just disappointing because we come here to race and we didn’t get to race,” said Liddell. “It would have been nice to have had a green-white-checkered finish just to get us back out on track. I think we had a shot in the rain and it would have been nice to put our full effort forth and finish out strong.”
IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship
Stevenson Motorsports will look to turn its top-five qualifying effort into a successful race result for Round 9 of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship at Road America on Sunday.
A soggy start to the weekend saw Lawson Aschenbach and Andrew Davis encounter wet track conditions for Friday’s practice sessions. Unfortunately, the team only ran one lap during the first session due to a fuel delivery problem.
It was all hands-on deck to diagnose and find the issue once the car went behind the wall. A massive team effort saw the Stevenson squad working for over four hours to make the repairs needed to get the car back on track, completing the project just in time for the second session later on Friday afternoon.
The team saw progressive results throughout each practice session with Aschenbach scoring the fastest lap time – 2:06.600-seconds – and Davis posting the third fastest time – 2:06.708-seconds – of the final practice run.
Davis was poised for a strong qualifying result after finding the pace of his Audi R8 LMS during practice. Davis immediately set a fast time good enough for pole, but as the session progressed his best lap time landed him in fifth.
“The car was really good this morning, both Lawson (Aschenbach) and I posted really fast times,” said Davis. “I was really excited going into qualifying because we had a good shot of getting on the pole. With the track temperature rising, it was a little harder squeezing that kind of time out of our Audi R8 LMS. It is a really competitive field out there and kudos to the two front rows, and then we will find ourselves on the inside of the third row. We have a good race car and we will be able to race to the front, so I’m not worried about that. We’ve done a good job making progress especially after losing that first session. I am proud of the guys and we will have our Audi up front again.”
Aschenbach is looking forward to making his way to the front as he takes over the second stint of the race.
“Practice was quite good and to get P1 is always great because we know we have speed in the car,” said Aschenbach. “We have to be sure we are prepared for any kinds of weather conditions tomorrow, especially if the temperatures cool down. We lost a little bit of time during the first practice session but the guys have been working hard and we rebounded really well. I am happy with everything this weekend so far and hopefully we can keep the car up front.”
Sunday’s race will mark the 300th IMSA/GRAND-AM/ALMS race for Stevenson Motorsports Team Strategist Mike Johnson. The former driver has scored numerous victories with countless champagne celebrations and has made many critical decisions at key times from the pit box. The Road America weekend is one that Johnson had been looking forward to for a long time as his family is also on hand to be a part of the race weekend.
In Memory of Charles Brown
Charles Brown, Parts Manager at Stevenson Toyota Collision Center, died Friday when the driver of an automobile pulled out in front of him on his motorcycle. Charles worked for Stevenson Automotive for almost seven years and had many co-workers who called him “friend”. Charles leaves behind a wife, Christy Brown, and two small girls under 3 years old. Funeral arrangements are not yet known.
