North Sim Racing comes up big in the California desert at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, as the Italian team and the #69 Porsche 911 GT3 R earn their premier win in VSCA SportsCar Championship competition.
Michele Villazzi got his team off to a great start by putting the #69 Porsche on pole position for the Course De Monterey. It was the team’s first ever pole position in VSCA, narrowly edging Daniel Gruber in the #44 Fischer Motorsport Porsche by only 0.025 seconds.
At the race start, confusion broke out as Villazzi created a huge gap towards the prototype start group, earning a black flag and drive-through penalty from Race Control in consequence, which dropped his team all the way to tenth place in GT PRO.
During the lone full-course yellow the team made a huge jump from eighth to third place, thanks to very quick work on the pit stop. At the 90-minute mark of the race, following many laps of battling with the #44 Fischer Motorsport Porsche, Villazzi re-took the lead.
Completing their lone driver swap pit stop on lap 63, it was Thomas D’Ambrosio behind the wheel now. Due to the off-cycle pit stop, the #69 Porsche temporarily dropped back to P7.
But on lap 77 D’Ambrosio retook the lead when the #911 RPM Racing Porsche of Brack Crouch opted to come down to pit lane for their pit stop.
As the sun set over Laguna Seca, the race entered crunch time, but D’Ambrosio kept a cool head and so it was North Sim Racing prevailing to bring home victory in a drama- and crash-filled race that left many teams and drivers talking long after the checkered flag waved.
An overjoyed D’Ambrosio said in victory lane:
“We feel very happy with this win; that we finally managed to finish a race without any issues, technical problems or car crashes.”
“We weren't nervous at all and felt very confident after the practice sessions, when we saw a significant gap between us and the other teams in GT PRO, maybe bigger than the other races. We immediately found a setup that we liked a lot, so we could work a lot on race pace. That made a huge difference for us and here we are in victory lane. It’s just so rewarding to finally get this win!”
On the long-lasting battle with the #44 Fischer Motorsport Porsche and his team-mate’s pass for the lead on lap 52, D’Ambrosio said:
“The battle between us and the 44 has been the most important stage of our race, and it was a really hard and fair battle. Overall, I must say our race has been pretty easy, compared to other teams who had a lot of problems with GTPs and LMP2s.”
Finishing second for the second straight race, the #44 Fischer Motorsport Porsche of Stephen Nobes and Daniel Gruber continues to be a threat for its own first win of the season, but had to settle for the runners-up spot in this one.
In an unusual twist, the race winners and runners-up led the exact same amount of laps (47 each).
Torque Freak Racing and their #6 Porsche of Neil Middleton and John Goodwin made it an all-Porsche GT PRO podium and was the team’s first podium in any class since winning at the same track in April of 2023.
RPM Racing’s #911 Porsche took fourth place, with Robert Lancaster and Brack Crouch combining for a total of five laps in the lead.
The first non-Porsche was the #151 World Of SimRacing Team BMW of Andres Quintana and Marco Pereira, who finished P5 after a post-race penalty.
Taking sixth place was the GT PRO championship-leading #84 Fischer Motorsport Porsche of Benjamin Fischer and Niklas Solle, who had their worst race since Daytona and were involved in numerous incidents in the race.
RaceTech Competition’s #55 Audi, who returned from their one-race suspension at Sebring, finished seventh. Danish divers Simon Husum and Steffen Jacobsen couldn’t help but feel disappointed after never fully recovering from a lap-63 crash that occurred one hour and 45 minutes into the race and that involved the #321 LMP2 class car of Tri-State Racing driver Christian Sherrard and the #84 Porsche of Fischer Motorsport’s Benjamin Fischer.
Likewise, earlier in the race, the RaceTech Competition machine also suffered damage from a contact with the #21 GSE Racing eSports Audi , that rejoined the track after going off course in turn six, leading to a collision between the only two Audis in the race.
The #21 car of Tom Wini and Kevin Mueller, who are looking to recapture their form since winning at Long Beach in February, ended up P8, one lap down.
Another team that continues to struggle this season, the #67 Kinetic Racing Porsche is still looking for its first win of the season. After finishing P9 at Laguna Seca, three laps down, the team will have to wait for another opportunity in the next race.
In a bizarre turn of events, just after completing their driver swap pit stop on lap 68 and upon exiting pit lane, Vincent L’Herbier suffered electrical problems in the #67 Porsche, which re-occurred one more time on lap 74 and costing the New Zealand team a shot at a competitive result.
Completing the top ten, the #23 Race4Cat Motorsport Porsche of Alex Rourera and Joan Guerrero took tenth place, five laps down after suffering a mechanical failure during the lone full-course yellow of the race.
After the race, the team announced it will withdraw its entry from the rest of the 2024 season, with the future of the team in the series uncertain.
Daytona winners #992 DS Racing eSports Team of Nelson Narciso and Bruno Carreira had a disaster of a race. On lap one, Narciso was caught by surprise in a contact with the #531 Ferrari of Yellow Submarine Squad’s Björn Klaassens going into the corkscrew, triggering a major incident that resulted in severe damage. In the end the team finished P11.
The final scored GT PRO class car to finish the race was the #32 BMW of Texas Speed Sim Racing and drivers Daniel McConnell and Zachary Lovelace, who were coming home in 12th place.
Fischer Motorsport one-two in GT PRO championship standings
For Fischer Motorsport, Laguna Seca was a two-fold story, with the #44 Porsche taking second place and the #84 Porsche earning its worst result since Daytona. But due to the combination of teams lower in the point standings earning good results at Laguna Seca, the #84 Porsche maintains the lead in GT PRO.
Freshly moving into second place is the #44 Porsche, 56 points back. RPM Racing’s #911 Porsche is new owner of third place at a 133-point deficit, while Kinetic Racing’s 67 Porsche and DS Racing eSports Team’s #992 Porsche drop to fourth and fifth, respectively.
Laguna Seca race winners #69 North Sim Racing meanwhile still have a big hole to climb out of in the championship standings, sitting in sixth and facing a 424-point gap to the lead.
“I think we can close the gap to the championship lead. We proved that we are fast and we train in a professional way. Wwe only need a pair of races without stupid accidents or technical issues and I'm sure we can continue to do well.”, said Thomas D’Ambrosio.
Sprint Cup standings wide open
With their win at Laguna Seca, the #69 North Sim Racing Porsche has taken the lead in the SPrint Cup standings, with a 28-point lead of the #84 Fischer Motorsport Porsche. Following in third is the #911 RPM Racing Porsche at a 33-point deficit.
All-new track, COTA, up next with competitive GT PRO battle shaping up
As the GT PRO championship battle proves to be hyper competitive in the classes’ first season, the series looks forward to its first visit to COTA in Austin, Texas on May 11th. GreenFlag TV will broadcast the race live, from start to finish.