Nick Tandy and Felipe Nasr, driving the #7 Porsche 963, have won the IMSA Grand Prix of Long Beach, taking their third consecutive IMSA win.
It’s also the second consecutive Porsche 1-2, with their teammates Matt Campbell and Mathieu Jaminet, in the sister #6 car, second. Third was the pole-sitting car of Philipp Eng and Dries Vanthoor in the #24 BMW M Hybrid V8.
Tandy started the #7 Porsche in third, with D. Vanthoor on pole in the #24 BMW. He retained it from his teammate Sheldon van der Linde in the #25 BMW, opening up a gap early on to Tandy behind.
Nick Yelloly, in the #93 Meyer Shank Acura ARX-06, got past Jaminet on the first lap. The Frenchman continued to hound Yelloly for the next 20 minutes, and dislodged the Acura’s legality panel at the hairpin as he attempted to get a better run onto the main straight.
Minutes later and the first of two full course cautions was called, as two GTD cars had collided at turn 8, with one in the barriers.
D. Vanthoor pitted the leading BMW, handing over to teammate Philipp Eng, but a poor pitstop set them back, with both Porsches getting the jump on them.
Tandy had handed over to Nasr in the #7, while Jaminet had been replaced by Campbell in the sister #6.
Weirdly, S. van der Linde now in the lead, plus Tom Blomqvist in the #60 Meyer Shank Acura, didn’t pit immediately, but two laps later, losing them track position.
Porsche consolidate lead
At the restart, then, the order was as follows: Nasr, Campbell, Eng, Earl Bamber and Gianmaria Bruni. Yellolky, who had been running third, had had to pit for the second time under caution to fix the broken legality panel, which the team had not fixed at the first stop.
The race restarted with everyone holding positions. Nasr amd Campbell began to build a gap to Eng behind, with the positions as they were at the half way mark.
But, shortly after half way, the second full course yellow occurred, this time for Bruni in the #85 JDC Miller Porsche. He’d been knocked backwards into a spin by Casper Stevenson in the #27 Aston Martin Vantage GT3 car, hitting the tyre barrier at turn 8.
Bruni was able to drive away, but the car dropped its rear wing dangerously close to the racing line, necessitating a FCY for it to be recovered. Bruni later pitted to have his car repaired, and managed to stay on the lead lap.
None of the other GTPs pitted under the caution in this short race, so it resumed with 36 minutes to go with Nasr still leading his teammate Campbell.
Third consecutive win
And that was the way it stayed until the Brazilian crossed the line to take his third successive win, and Porsche’s second 1-2 on the trot.
Campbell was just a smidge over 3 seconds back from Nasr, with Eng a further 10 seconds away in the #24 BMW. Fourth was Earl Bamber in the #31 Action Express Cadillac V-Series.R, while fifth went to Marco Wittmann, onboard the #25 BMW.
Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque were sixth in the #10 WTR Cadillac, with his teammate and brother Jordan Taylor seventh in the sister #40 car.
Eighth was Roman de Angelis, alongside Ross Gunn, in the #23 Aston Martin Valkyrie, while ninth was Colin Braun in the #60 MSR Acura. Rounding out the top was Bruni in the #85 JDC Miller Porsche, with Renger van der Zande in the #93 MSR Acura 11th, a lap down, after losing a lap fixing the legality panel earlier on.
