ACURA AT LIME ROCK PARK
Acura comes to the GT-only race at Lime Rock Park on a roll, as a combination of race wins and podium finishes have the Acura NSX GT3 Evo, the Meyer Shank Racing team, and drivers Trent Hindman and Mario Farnbacher all leading their respective championships after five of 10 championship rounds.
Saturday’s two-hour, 40-minute Northeast Grand Prix is the first of two IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship stand-alone events for the GTLM and GTD classes. The second GT-only race will take place at Virginia International Raceway in August.
Acura Motorsports has recorded six previous victories at Lime Rock Park, dating to 1992, when Parker Johnstone and Dan Marvin drove their Comptech Acura Spice SE91P to the Camel Lights class victory. The pair repeated its class win in 1993 in the team’s updated Acura Spice SE92P.
In 2008, David Brabham and Scott Sharp took their LMP2 class Highcroft Racing Acura 01b prototype to the overall victory at Lime Rock. After Acura had stepped up to the LMP1 class in 2009, De Ferran Motorsports owner/driver Gil de Ferran and Simon Pagenaud scored a second-consecutive overall victory with the new ARX-02a prototype.
Acura’s most recent wins at Lime Rock came in 2012 and 2013, when the manufacturer won both LMP1 and LMP2 back-to-back. In both years, Klaus Graf and Lucas Luhr won overall in the Muscle Milk Racing Acura ARX-03a. In 2012, Level 5 Motorsports finished second and won the LMP2 category in the Acura ARX-03b co-driven by Christophe Bouchut and Scott Tucker. One year later, Tucker teamed with Ryan Briscoe to finish third overall and repeat as LMP2 class winner.
MEYER SHANK RACING
In the GTD category, the Meyer Shank Racing team and drivers Trent Hindman and Mario Farnbacher extended their championship lead during the past month with a class win at Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen and a second-place finish at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park.
MSR drivers Farnbacher and Hindman now have a 19-point lead in the championship, with 151 points over 132 points for their nearest rivals, Townsend Bell and Frank Montecalvo. Robby Foley and Bill Auberlen are third, with 123 points.
In the ultra-competitive GTD Manufacturers’ Championship – with a total of nine automotive manufacturers taking part in this production-based series – Acura has climbed from fourth to first over the last month. Acura now has 152 points, to 150 for Lamborghini. Lexus is third with 149 points, followed by BMW and Ferrari with 135 each.
For 2019, MSR has entered into a partnership with businesswoman/racer Jackie Heinricher and sponsor Caterpillar to field the #57 Acura NSX GT3 Evo for an all-female driver lineup anchored by the four-time Acura race winner Katherine Legge. Co-drivers include fellow former IndyCar Series driver Bia Figueiredo, and two-time IMSA champion Christina Nielsen, who will join Legge at Lime Rock. Legge stands seventh in the GTD championship with 116 points.
Based on information generated from the global NSX GT3 Customer Racing Program, the Acura NSX GT3 Evo features performance gains, improved drivability, a 25 percent increase in engine life and greater component durability. The result is a racing platform designed to appeal to a wide range of professional and amateur drivers.
ACURA TEAM PENSKE
IMSA’s Prototype category is not a part of the IMSA weekend at Lime Rock, but the championship-leading Acura ARX-05s will return to the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship for the August 2-4 round at Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisconsin.
Propelled by back-to-back wins at the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach and at the Acura Mid-Ohio Sports Car Challenge, plus podium finishes at Detroit, Watkins Glen and Canadian Tire Motorsports Park, Acura Team Penske’s Juan Pablo Montoya and Dane Cameron lead the Drivers’ Championship standings by three points [207-204] over primary rivals Pipo Derani and Felipe Nasr. Driving the second Acura Team Penske entry this season, Helio Castroneves and Ricky Taylor are third in the championship battle with 198 points.
Acura also leads the DPi Manufacturers’ Championship fight, with 230 points to 227 for Cadillac. Mazda is third with 216 points and Nissan is fourth with 202 points.
WHERE TO WATCH
Same-day US Network television coverage from Lime Rock Park begins at 9:30 p.m. on Saturday, July 20, on the NBC Sports Network. Complete, flag-to-flag race coverage also will be available on NBCSports.com and the NBC Sports App with NBCSN authentication.
Fans can listen in to audio commentary via IMSA.com, RadioLeMans.com and Sirius XM Radio; and follow the race live via in-car cameras, IMSA Radio and timing & scoring available worldwide on IMSA.com and the IMSA mobile device App.
Video recaps from this weekend’s Acura Motorsports activities at Lime Rock Park will be posted on the “Honda Racing/HPD” YouTube channel. Produced by the Carolinas Production Group, the video packages can be found at: https://www.youtube.com/HondaRacingHPDTV.