IMSA's president Scott Atherton confirmed the Advance Auto Parts Sportscar Showdown was part of the series' schedule for the 2017 IMSA SportsCar Championship at Road America's victory lane in August 2016.[1] It was the fourth consecutive year the event was held as part of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. The 2017 Advance Auto Parts Sportscar Showdown was the fourth of twelve scheduled sports car races of 2017 by IMSA, and was the second round not held on the held as part of the North American Endurance Cup.[2] The race was held at the twenty-turn 3.426mi (5.514km)Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas on May 6, 2017.[2] Unlike in previous years where the race was run alongside the FIA World Endurance Championship event as a double-header, the 2017 edition was a standalone event.[3]
There were three practice sessions preceding the start of the race on Saturday, two on Thursday and one on Friday. The first two one-hour sessions were on Thursday morning and afternoon. The third on Friday morning lasted an hour.[11]
Practice 1
The first practice session took place at 9:45 am CT on Thursday and ended with Ricky Taylor topping the charts for Wayne Taylor Racing, with a lap time of 1:57.116.[12] The PC class was topped by the #38 Performance Tech Motorsports Oreca FLM09 of Patricio O'Ward with a time of 2:00.522.[13]Dirk Müller was fastest in GTLM and Tristan Vautier set the fastest time GTD.[12]
In Friday afternoon's 90-minute four-group qualifying, each category had separate 15-minute sessions. Regulations stipulated that teams nominate one qualifying driver, with the fastest laps determining each class' starting order. IMSA arranged the grid to put Prototypes ahead of the PC, GTLM and GTD cars.[24][11]
Qualifying was broken into four sessions. The first was for cars in GTD class. Mathieu Jaminet qualified on pole for the class driving the #28 Alegra Motorsports, besting Jack Hawksworth in the #15 3GT Racing entry.[25]
The third session of qualifying was for cars in the PC class. James French set the fastest time driving the #38 Performance Tech Motorsports entry.[26][27]
1 The No. 15 3GT Racing entry was moved to the back of the GTD after failing post qualifying technical inspection.[31]
2 The No. 80 Lone Star Racing entry was moved to the back of the GTD as per Article 43.6 of the Sporting regulations (Change of starting tires).[24]
Race
Post-race
With a total of 141 points, Jordan Taylor and Ricky Taylor's victory allowed them to increase their advantage over Fittipaldi and Barbosa in the Prototype Drivers' Championship to 22 points.[32] In PC, Yount and Rice advanced from fourth to second.[32] With 124 points, García and Magnussen's victory allowed them to take the lead of the GTLM Drivers' Championship.[32] With a total of 133 points, Bleekemolen and Keating's victory allowed them to increase their advantage over Balzan and Nielsen to 24 points.[32] Cadillac and Mercedes-AMG continued to top their respective Manufacturers' Championships while Chevrolet took the lead of the GTLM Manufactures' Championship.[32] Wayne Taylor Racing, Performance Tech Motorsports, and Riley Motorsports kept their respective advantages in their respective of Teams' Championships while Corvette Racing took the lead of the GTLM Teams' Championship with eight races left in the season.[32]
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.