VGMC Racing’s Victor Gonazlez Jr and Karl Wittmer won a sensational end-of-race battle to take victory in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge at Sebring last week.
The Honda duo had started from next-to-last on the grid for the two-hour race, but ran with an alternate strategy that worked to propel them up the order amidst an incident-induced caution-interrupted race.
Of the race’s 41-lap length, a total of 22 laps were held under caution periods, allowing for an alternative strategy to reap huge rewards.
At the start, the #77 Hyundai Elantra N of Tyler Maxson and Mason Filippi led away from pole, with Filippi heading the field until the end of the first caution period at the end of lap six.
Bryan Herta Autosport team-mate Robert Wickens in the #33 Hyundai then took over at the front, but the racing only lasted for a further four laps until another caution period, during which time Wickens came into the pits, handing the lead to Gonzalez, who had stayed out in the VGMC Honda.
Indeed, it was that strategy of not pitting which hauled the Gonzalez / Wittmer Honda up the order, as one of only two cars in the entire TCR field to make just the one pitstop in the start-stop race.
Towards the end of the third caution period, Gonzalez brought his Civic Type-R into the pits on lap 23, which dropped Wittmer to sixth in class when he rejoined the race, with the Audi of Preston Brown then briefly leading before he too made the sole stop for him and Eric Rockwell.
With Wittmer then passing Rory van der Steur’s Hyundai Veloster and Ryan Norman’s Hyundai Elantra at the restart, the Canadian driver found himself in third position by lap 26.
For the next 15 laps the race was headed by the #17 Audi of Mikey Taylor, who had taken over from Chris Miller on lap 23. By lap 35 Taylor had opened up a 2.7-second lead over the best Hyundai of Michael Lewis, but the caution period wiped out this small advantage.
After another four-lap full-course caution, required when the GS class Audi R8 of Max Faulkner slid into the barriers, racing resumed for just two laps and Wittmer benefitted when Taylor and Lewis made contact at Turn 10 on the last lap.
Despite a last-corner slide, Wittmer held on to claim a last-gasp win ahead of Lewis, with his margin of victory being a mere 0.182 seconds – the fourth-closest finish in the history of the Michelin Pilot Challenge’s TCR class.
“We have worked so hard to build this from zero,” said Puerto Rican Gonzalez, who bagged his first win in the series. “A Hispanic team, all my crew guys are Hispanic, and we got a Canadian as my teammate…
“This is just the first step. We need to keep building up. I don’t want to get emotional but I’m really happy!”
Lewis was thus second, despite him and Taylor Hagler having had to serve two drive-through penalties for tyre infringements (using invalid qualifying tyres), with Miller completing the podium after losing out in the final laps of the race.
Gavin Ernstone and Jonathan Morley bounced back from their disappointing start to the season to take fourth in the #61 Road Shagger Racing Audi, ahead of the HART Honda of Chad Gilsinger and Steve Eich in fifth.
After a three-stop strategy, van der Steur and Tyler Gonzalez were sixth in the field’s sole Hyundai Veloster, ahead of the #98 Hyundai Elantra of Parker Chase and Harry Gottsacher.
The #77 Hyundai of Maxson and Filippi was the first retirement of the race after 18 laps when Mason Filippi tangled with the #3 Toyota of Kyle Marcelli, racing in the Grand Sport class, whilst running in seventh in the TCR class on lap 18.
Marcelli went for a gap inside Filippi between Turns 15 and 16, but the Hyundai driver was seemingly unaware of the faster GS-class car and the two made contact, pitching them both heavily into the barriers front-in.
A lengthy full-course yellow period followed, which prompted a raft of pitstops. Both drivers walked away unaided from the shunt.
Lewis and Hagler now lead the standings, having followed up on their second-place finish at the season-opening event at Daytona in January, whilst Gonzalez has leapt up to second, 110 points behind.
The next event takes place at Laguna Seca Raceway on 1 May.