Meyer Shank Racing Wins the Chevrolet Grand Prix at CTMP

The #60 Meyer Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian Acura ARX-06 with drivers Tom Blomqvist and Colin Braun survived multiple yellow flags to win the Chevrolet Grand Prix at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park (CTMP). The win marks the teams second win pending any further investigations since the team won the Rolex 24 at Daytona International Speedway earlier this year. The win at CTMP did not come without drama. In the last hour and a half of the race there were 4 incidents that resulted in cautions on track. The race ended under a yellow flag after an incident with the No. 01 Cadillac Racing Cadillac V-Series.R with 5 minutes remaining. All GTP cars on grid completed 120 laps with the exception being the No. 01 Cadillac.

The Meyer Shank Racing drivers had the following statements for IMSA.com:

Tom Blomqvist – Meyer Shank Racing No. 60 Acura ARX-06

“The racing gods were looking down on us a little bit today. We rolled the dice (with pit stop strategy) to try and go long, and the only way we were going to win that race was if the yellows kind of played into our corner. Thankfully, they did.”

“I’m just so happy for the guys. They’ve worked their back sides off all year long, really. This car has been a lot of work. We haven’t had the greatest run of recent races, so to get the pole yesterday and finish the job off today is just amazing.”

Colin Braun – Meyer Shank Racing No. 60 Acura ARX-06

“I’ve just always loved this place and it’s got a great rhythm to it. When you kind of get that confidence that it’s going well, you can go out and attack straight away, and when it works, it keeps the confidence high.”

“Everybody did a great job. The Acura cars have been fast all week, and our team specifically worked hard. Those yellows played into our favor and I still had a bit of fuel to save, but I knew if I could get a good jump and kind of push hard and build a gap for a lap or two, I could settle in and hit the fuel number. It was a lot of fun.”

Wayne Taylor Racing’s Konica Minolta Acura ARX-06 took second place securing a 1-2 finish for Acura. Driver had the following words, “Before the race, the theme of the weekend was we need to put together a weekend like we are used to and just get back to normal. It just so happened the No. 31 had a bad day and the points came together. We’re happy about that, and happy to get back on a roll of positive momentum. We’ll take a second place to the sister (Acura) car very happily and try to build on that for Road America.”

The No. 25 BMW M Team RLL BMW M Hybrid V8 shared by Connor De Phillippi and Nick Yelloly claimed their 4th podium finish in the last five races. RLL racing is 10 points off of the GTP championship lead.

LMP3

Felipe Fraga made it 3 straight Le Mans Prototype 3 (LMP3) victories for Fraga, Gar Robinson and the No. 74 Riley Ligier JS P320. The No. 74 car held the lead for the majority of the race but briefly lost the lead only to reclaim it int he final minutes of the race. Fraga stated, “It was a crazy race. Today, I think they were a little bit faster than us, especially in the straights. … In the GT traffic I basically caught him like 2-3 seconds in two laps. Then I just had a gap, like he opened into the last corner and I think he didn’t expect me to try in the last corner, and I did it.” The move paid off. However with every winner there is the flip side to the story. Fraga made a late move on Garett Grist in the No. 30 Jr III Racing Ligier similarly to a move made at the 6 Hours of Glen. The stewards deemed no further action was necessary however Crist had other thoughts.

“It’s pretty clear what happened so there’s really not much to say, I guess. I mean, Watkins Glen I raced clean, here I raced clean…I guess we know how we can race, though. Three rounds left.”

GTD/GTD Pro

Corvette Racing continued its in class form extending their championship points with the No. 03 car. The car now sits in third place. The Pfaff Motosports Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) finished second ahead of the WeatherTech Racing No. 79 Mercedes-AMG GT3. The No. 79 car is currently in second place in the championship behind the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan. In GTD the No. 01 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 took the win ahead of the No. 70 Inception Racing McLaren 720S GT3 EVO in second and the Team Korthoff Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 in third.

The next race is IMSA Sportscar Weekend at Road America August 3-6 2023. Full race results from this weekend at CTMP are available below.