The 12 minutes of mayhem where Man City threw the title race away
Man Cityâs title race takes a hit after a 12-minute collapse, with Arsenal now in the lead.
JDC-Miller Motorsports achieved a surprising victory at Laguna Seca with their privateer Porsche 963, led by rookie Laurin Heinrich. Heinrich overtook Earl Bamber's Cadillac V-Series.R on the final lap to secure the win.
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Privateer Porsche Stuns at Laguna SecaBrandon Badraoui
The cynics sometimes suggest that IMSA is the only major series where everybody gets a trophy.
When it came to the surprise victory by JDC-Miller Motorsports crew at the WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca in round 4 of the WeatherTech Championship, the trophy came the old-fashioned way. The privateer Porsche 963 team earned it thanks to the late-race heroics of 24-year-old Laurin Heinrich.
It was remarkable GTP rookie Heinrich who reeled in the leading Cadillac V-Series.R of Earl Bamber on the last lap of Sundayâs race. âItâs an honor for me to fight with Earl because I followed him his whole career when I was not professional yet,â said the young Porsche factory driver who co-drove with Tijmen van der Helm. âAnd to go side by side with Earl and door to door around Laguna Seca in a GTP car, that was so much fun. The JDC car was amazing to drive, such a joy.â
Remarkably, the victory makes Heinrich the GTP points leader over Jack Aitken, Bamberâs co-driver. The Porsche Penske Motorsport teammates that Heinrich co-drove with to victory at Daytona and SebringâFelipe Nasr and Julien Andlauerâfinished seventh and dropped to third in the points.
Tijmen van der Helm (left) and Laurin Heinrich in victory lane with the winners' sticker.Michael L. Levitt - Getty Images
JDC-Miller Motorsports won the race at Laguna Seca with their privateer Porsche 963.
Laurin Heinrich overtook Earl Bamber's Cadillac V-Series.R on the last lap to secure the victory.
Laurin Heinrich co-drove with Tijmen van der Helm for JDC-Miller Motorsports.
The race was part of the IMSA WeatherTech Championship.
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âThis kid is incredible,â said team principal John Church of the young German on loan from the factory. âI mean the drive he put on and did everything right. So couldnât be happier for the whole team.â
The cynics may also suggest that Balance of Performance (BoP) played an outsized role in the first privateer victory in the current GTP era that began in 2023.
IMSA has indeed created a new subcategory applicable only to the Porsche 963 team of JDC-Miller. The factory Porsches of the Penske team have new aerodynamics, but because JDC-Miller did not update to the new bodywork, it did not receive the handicap applied to the winning team at Daytona and Sebring. Thus, a weight break for the privateers and original bodywork that worked quite well at Laguna, thank you.
Welcome to the ânew eraâ where the Porsches have only won the first three of four races. Thatâs in place of last yearâs sweep.
It bears pointing out that at least Lagunaâs outcome was in play until the last lap, when Heinrich passed Bamberâs Action Express Racing Cadillac with the help of timely traffic and a quicker pace. The victory was about execution, tire management, and pit strategy. Unlike the â36 hours of Florida," this Porsche crew did not dominate from pillar to post like the Penske squad.
JDC-Miller last won a prototype race at Sebringâs 12-hour in 2021, which confirms that teams can make a difference in addition to the BoP.
Likewise, the Mustang GT3 team of Ford Racing and its Multimatic crew found an edge in the closing stages. The winning GTD Pro team gambled on pitting early with an undercut and that no caution would bunch the field. Thus, it turned an earlier penalty for contact with a GTP car into an advantage.
In GTD, Danny Formal and Trent Hindman led 40 laps in their Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo2 to get the win for Wayne Taylor Racing.
âWe didnât expect to be completely up front here," said Christopher Mies, who co-drove the winning Mustang with Frederic Vervisch. âAnd if you see the pace from the cars behind, they probably had a bit more in it, and we were just lucky to gamble and that there was no late yellow.â
If that sounds like a message to IMSA officials to go easy on BoP for the EVO version of the Mustang prior to the race in the streets of Detroit at the end of the month, so be it.