Dane Cameron, Eric Curran win IMSA race in Canada

By AP
Published

BOWMANVILLE, Ontario (AP) Dane Cameron survived a wet and wild final 50 minutes to win the IMSA SportsCar Championship race Sunday at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park.

Cameron held off Stephen Simpson in the rain in the No. 31 Action Express Racing Cadillac DPi-V.R, teaming with Eric Curran for their first victory of the season.

Simpson and co-driver Misha Goikhberg finished second in the No. 85 JDC-Miller Motorsports ORECA LM P2 in the race that the featured changing weather conditions and various pit strategies between teams opting for wet weather or ''slick'' dry-weather tires.

''This place is always difficult in multi-class racing, especially with the prototype, you can carry so much more speed than a GT car in the quick sections,'' Cameron said. ''You get a stack-up effect, and they are running their race and it gets pretty messy.

''Then the rain came and it made its own drama. Some were on slick, some on drys, some people were being more conservative, some more aggressive. I just tried to not mess up and stay on the track and not get caught up in someone else's mess. It's pretty wild, but that's what makes IMSA racing so exciting. It's something to see from the driver's seat and something to see from the fences for the fans.''

Cadillac won for the seventh time this season, with each of the marque's three teams having at least one victory in the manufacturer's first year in IMSA.

A sudden downpour while under caution with 48 minutes remaining forced the Prototype leaders to pit road. Of the seven cars on the lead lap, only the points-leading No. 10 Cadillac driven by Jordan Taylor opted to remain on slick tires.

The move appeared to pay off when, despite dropping from second to fourth immediately following the restart because of the damp track, Taylor made up ground as the track continued to dry. He took the lead when each of the teams that took rain tires had to pit with 30 minutes left.

Taylor looked as if he was going to cruise to his sixth victory in seven races alongside brother Ricky Taylor, but was involved in an incident with the Chevrolet Corvette C7.R of Tommy Milner with 21 minutes left. Taylor remained on the track throughout the caution, but gave way to Cameron immediately on the restart with 10 minutes to go and pitted to repair the damaged car on the following lap.

Cameron was in the process of holding off a late charge from Simpson when David Ostella flipped in the No. 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Ligier with just a handful of minutes remaining, forcing the race to end under caution. Ostella was evaluated and released from the infield care center following the incident.

Performance Tech Motorsports teammates James French and Patricio O'Ward continued their perfect season in the Prototype Challenge class with their sixth consecutive victory in the No. 38 entry. Bill Auberlen and Alexander Sims took their second GT Le Mans class victory in two weeks and led a 1-2 sweep for BMW.

In the GT Daytona class, Stevenson Motorsports teammates Andrew Davis and Lawson Aschenbach combined for their first victory in the series in the No. 57 Audi. On Saturday, the team won the IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge race with its new Chevrolet Camaro.