With all hands on deck and James French behind the wheel, the No. 38 Dash Neighborhoods/Phillips 66 PC car finished third. French, from Sheboygan, Wisconsin, started seventh after TUDOR United SportsCar Championship qualifying.
“I am very happy with third place today,” French said. “I would feel terrible if David (Ostella) had to start seventh. I also was happy for the final yellow, not for the reason that it happened, but that it happened. It gave me a second chance to get to the front. We also had made a few changes before the race that I think worked. Everybody on the team obviously did a fantastic job. Hopefully David can end up on the podium tomorrow, too.”
In the Cooper Tires Prototype Lites Powered by Mazda portion of the 45-minute race, Robert Alon started and finished fourth in the No. 9 Performance Tech entry.
“Before the restart, I was running third with a big gap, and I felt like I had it,” Alon said. “But on the restart, I just wasn’t able to keep my position. (Andrew) Novich was able to just plow through the field and get by me. I had been battling it out with Christian (Potolicchio) and had a great race with him for position. It was a good race. We’ll try for the podium tomorrow.”
Teammate Joel Janco didn’t fare as well. A mechanical problem 13 laps into the race sent him spinning into the wall adjacent to Turn 5, ending his race early. The team will work through the night to find the problem so Janco can try to race tomorrow.
“Unfortunately, we haven’t concluded exactly what happened,” Janco said. “I know the team is working hard to find out what broke and sent me into the wall. Hopefully we can find out what it was. I think I’ll be all right for tomorrow. We’ll see how my neck feels before making any decisions.”
Team Principal Brent O’Neill is happy with his PC car’s positioning for the final segment of the Oak Tree Grand Prix at VIR, which starts at 10:45 Sunday. The race will be streamed live on IMSA.com.
“They all had been doing a great job out there,” O’Neill said. “Robert really did a good job. This is his first year racing anything, so to be able to be running up front with guys like (Mikhail) Goikhberg is really impressive. Joel today just had an unfortunate race. It happens in racing. We’ll fix it, and he’ll have a good race tomorrow, I’m sure.
For updates on the team, follow Performance Tech Motorsports on Facebook.
About Me: Adam has been a race fan since the first time he went through the tunnel under the Daytona International Speedway almost 30 years ago. He has had the privilege of travelling to races all across the state of Florida (as well as one race in Ohio), watching nearly everything with a motor compete for fame and glory, as well as participating in various racing schools to get the feel of what racecar drivers go through every week. Adam has spent the last three years covering motorsports for Examiner.com., where he had the opportunity to see the racing world from behind the scenes as well as the grandstands. He invites everyone to follow him on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus, and looks forward to sharing his enthusiasm for all things racing with the readers of SpeedwayDigest.com.Be sure to tune in for his weekly sports talk program, Thursday Night Thunder, where he discusses the latest in motorsports news with drivers, crew members, and fans. The show takes place every Thursday at 8:00 pm EST on the Speedway Digest Radio Network.
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