IVRA Clubsport - Circuit of the Americas
Time for another IVRA race, this time in the Clubsport series on the COTA track in Texas. A wide track that still provides some challenges for multiclass with its sharp turns and mix of fast and slow sections.
With the Swedish national championship running in parallel, we didn’t have the normal queue of drivers who were willing to suit up for this race, but in the end we put a strong team on the starting line in our two Porsche 911 Cup cars.
The race started off ok, both cars settled in and started to put laps on the clock. This was a four hour race, so there’s no immediate rush to pick up spots but it’s usually better to get used to the traffic and the cars around you.
Disaster struck with 30 minutes on the clock, another 911 Cup car didn’t brake in time and hit our #16 car from behind, flipping it over in the process. Not the end of the race, but any hopes of a good finishing position ended there. The car was towed to the pits, fixed up and finished the race, however the damage from the collision made the car a lot slower and the car finished several laps down from the leader.
Car #26 had no such monumental issues and soldiered on, but this wasn’t our race to win. Spins and no luck with the safety cars ended the car at 14th place, far down from where we hoped it would end and far from indicative of the pace of our drivers, it just fell apart this time.
Not the greatest start of a season you could wish for, but there are still many races to come and we intend to learn from this and move forward and show ourselves and the other teams that we still are a force to be reckoned with.