Dane Cameron and Marcus Palltala finished on the GTD podium in the 2¾-hour Tudor United Sports Car Championship race at Circuit Of The Americas in Austin, Texas. It was Turner Motorsport's 300th professional race—so the team's Z4, which usually runs #94, ran #300 to mark the occasion.
Both Palltala and Cameron led during the race despite an additional 25 kilos of weight that IMSA had given the car. In the end the win went to Jeroen Bleekemoelen and Ben Keating in the #33 Dodge Viper SRT. Andy Lally and John Potter were second in the Magnus Racing Porsche, while Cameron and Palltala were third in the Turner Z4. Unofficially the finish leaves Cameron with a lead in drivers’ points and Turner with a lead in team points going into the season finale, the Petit Le Mans race at Road Atlanta, which will be run in two weeks.
The BMW Team RLL Z4s finished sixth and seventh in the GTLM class. Andy Priaulx and Bill Auberlen finished sixth in Car #55, while John Edwards and Dirk Müller finished seventh in #56. Edwards had qualified sixth, while Priaulx qualified seventh. The Z4s were given a weight increase for the race, although they were also given a larger restrictor. The Corvettes, leaders earlier in the season, also struggled with restrictions; they finished behind the BMWs, with Jan Magnussen and Antonio Garcia ninth and Tommy Milner and Oliver Gavin tenth. The class win went to the Dodge Viper driven by Jon Bomarito and Kuno Wittmer. Dominic Farnbacher and Marc Goosens finished second in another Viper, while Patrick Long and Michael Christenson rounded out the podium in the #912 Porsche North America 911 RSR. Nick Tandy in the #911 Porsche had looked like a winner, but he exited late in the race with a driveline problem.
Team RLL principal Bobby Rahal said “This was the race we expected and I was afraid might happen. The Porsches were almost two seconds a lap faster on the fastest laps, the Vipers not much worse. We just cannot maintain the pace with the way the rules are. I hope things are better at Petit Le Mans as they are very unfair right now. There is no balance of performance.”—Brian S. Morgan
