GTWC America title race is still alive after Barber weekend

With the top two Pro Cup squads in the GT World Challenge America standings winning a race each at Barber Motorsports Park, the battle for the crown will be carried to Indianapolis, as the No. 99 Random Vandals BMW M4 GT3 Evo of Connor de Phillippi and Kenton Koch won on Saturday but let the opportunity of a clean sweep slip away on Sunday, as their problems opened the way for the No. 34 JMF Motorsports Mercedes AMG GT3 Evo of Mikael Grenier and Michai Stephens.
 
The Race 1 pole position would work well with the right plan for the No. 91 Regulator Mercedes, and the first goal for Philip Ellis was achieved in the first corner by keeping the Random Vandals BMWs at bay while a full course yellow being called as the No. 50 Chouest Povoledo Corvette stopped on track.
 
The other part of Ellis’ plans would depend of green flag time and how Random Vandals Racing would play as they had both cars in front of the Pro Cup field, meaning no immediate necessity to chase Ellis. Unfortunately for the No. 91, things didn’t work well as the No. 50 stopped again on track, with the front facing the armco this time, calling another yellow, with an extra 11 minutes of time consumed with Ellis’ gains neutralized.
 
Ellis stood on track for as long as possible to stop at least a lap later than the competition, and with the plans to open a huge gap being ruined by yellow flags, not even tire change was an option in order to keep Jeff Burton ahead for as much time as possible to eventually cover the No. 91 from the Pro-Am Cup opposition.
 
Connor de Phillippi burned the gap to Burton really quick and put the No. 99 Random Vandals BMW in the overall lead, covering his position from the No. 34 JMF Mercedes until Mikael Grenier finds Jeff Burton on the way, which also didn’t take long.
 
Grenier quickly got the much needed clean air with 30 minutes to go, but the pace wasn’t coming for the No. 34, meaning that the Canadian was more prone to fall into Varun Choksey’s radar than to chase de Phillippi. Through the rest of the race, Grenier fought back but was only able to discount a second of the six he had behind the No. 99 Random Vandals BMW, which went straight to the win as Connor de Phillippi was in control of the situation for the whole time.
 
Jeff Burton fell off hard in the order as he didn’t have the pace to ward off the Pro-Am Cup competition, with Robby Foley doing a dominant run to win the class in the No. 29 Turner BMW. Another car in control of its class was the No. 6 Dollahite Mustang, but in this case, Scott Dollahite and Eric Power were dominant during the whole race in the Am Cup, even challenging the back of the Pro-Am Cup field from the second third of the race onwards.
 
GTWC America - Barber Race 1 results
 

The last sprint race of the season had the No. 34 JMF Mercedes taking command of the field while the No. 99 Random Vandals BMW had the No. 32 GMG Porsche and the rest of the cars on its rear wing, with Connor de Phillippi needing two laps to get rid of Tom Sargeant’s pressure, with the No. 32 setting for defense of the Pro-Am Cup lead.
 
De Phillippi was consistently chasing Mikael Grenier, keeping the gap at around 2 seconds, but with 22 minutes of racing the No. 99 went for an emergency fuel stop to mitigate a fuel pickup problem, with the same happening to the sister No. 51 car. This unscheduled stop left the way open for the No. 34, in special because behind Grenier, the Pro-Am Cup competitors were too busy with their own matters.
 
With a good advantage in the Pro Cup, the No. 34 was stopped before the halfway mark for regular service, coming back to the overall lead once the rest of the pit stops was done. In between the Pro-Am Cup lead battle, Alex Sedgwick was putting the No. 18 RS1 Porsche in the overall podium, but the lost time trying to pass the No. 32 GMG Porsche cost too much, as almost 30 seconds separated Michai Stephens from Sedgwick.
 
Behind the Pro Cup top two, Todd Coleman clearly didn’t have the pace of his peers and fell to third in the Pro-Am Cup, leaving the No. 32 free of any opposition as the No. 11 DXDT Corvette was 12 seconds behind, but this proved to be short lived, as Blake McDonald crushed the gap to Kyle Washington, and once the pressure took the best of Washington, McDonald put the No. 11 in the Pro-Am Cup lead.
 
The final minutes were for Stephens to bring the winning No. 34 JMF Mercedes home as the 30 second gap to the No. 18 RS1 Porsche was consolidated. Behind the Pro Cup podium, the No. 11 DXDT Corvette prevailed to win the Pro-Am Cup, and near the back of the field, the No. 6 Dollahite Mustang completed the Am Cup sweep.
 
GTWC America - Barber Race 2 results
 
De Phillippi and Koch (No. 99) lead the Pro Cup standings with 233.5 points, while Stephens and Grenier (No. 34) keep the chase with 218.5, and Sedgwick and Heylen (No. 18) will be the outsiders of the title race with 200 points, as the Indianapolis 8 Hour on 19 October will pay double points for GTWC America.
 
PHOTOS: SRO/Fabian Lagunas