ELKHART LAKE, Wisconsin – Mercedes-AMG Motorsport Customer Racing teams Winward Racing and Korthoff Preston Motorsports combined for a competitive IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship performance that produced a GTD pole position, a race-leading run and a fourth-place finish at Road America this weekend. Mikael Grenier won the first pole of the season for the No. 32 Korthoff Preston Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 team on Saturday and went on to lead 21 laps in Sunday’s two-hour and 40-minute race. Closing driver Kenton Koch then ran as high as third in the No. 32, but it was the championship-leading No. 57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 of Russell Ward and Philip Ellis that emerged in the race’s final minutes for a Mercedes-AMG-best fourth-place finish after a last lap shake up in the GTD ranks.
Grenier led the first nine laps of the race from the pole and, after a quick dash to the pits under an early caution with the majority of the competition for a splash of fuel, regained the top spot for 12 more circuits up front. He pitted from the lead after a nearly 90-minute race-opening stint and Koch took over for the fight to the finish.
The stop was well executed, but the No. 32 pitted under caution and lost a few on-track positions after some competitors took their pitside service a few laps earlier. Undeterred, Koch kept the pressure on and steadily worked his way back up the order and into the top three with just under four minutes remaining in the race.
Taking the white flag for the final race lap in third, and with Ellis close behind in the Winward No. 57 in fourth, Koch was exiting Turn 3 only to quickly encounter an off-pace GTP entry that had just rejoined the race from the pits. Quick action by Koch avoided what would have been a heavy collision, but the No. 32 momentarily went off course and, in an instant, dropped from third to the team’s seventh place finishing position.
Equally quick reflexes by Ellis just behind kept him from collecting both Koch and the GTP car, but after briefly inheriting third place, the split-second lost avoiding the collisions allowed another competitor at full speed to slip by for the final podium spot.
Despite finishing out of the top two for only the second time this season, Winward maintained its position as the top team in GTD despite a hard-fought and challenging race at Road America.
Starting driver Ward took the green flag from fifth on the grid and, for the second-straight race, drove two stints in another solid race-opening run for over an hour. Ward handed the No. 57 off from fourth place to Ellis who closed out the race’s final 90 minutes with an eye on both a strong finish and maintaining the team’s season-long first-place standing in the GTD championships.
Despite losing a bit of their points lead for the first time this year, Ward, Ellis and the Winward No. 57 remain atop the GTD driver and team championships by 268 points, 2,396 – 2,128, with three races remaining on the 2024 calendar.
The Korthoff Preston team also continues to hang tough in the GTD team championship standings in third place with 1,796 points.
Meanwhile, the collective performance of both Winward and Korthoff Preston at Road America increased Mercedes-AMG’s strong lead in the GTD manufacturer championship standing to an even 2,500 points, a season-high 473 tallies ahead of the second-place competitor’s 2,027 points.
Next up for Mercedes-AMG Motorsport Customer Racing teams in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship is the Michelin GT Challenge at VIRginia International Raceway (VIR), August 23 – 25. The VIR race is the only race of the year featuring only the production-based GTD and GTD Pro series cars.
Mikael Grenier, Driver – No. 32 Korthoff Preston Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3: “We had a good weekend in general. We had a good race strategy, but we got a bit unlucky with the second full course yellow because some of the competition had already pit before that because they had a short stop to do. We lost some track position there, but it was just really unlucky because I think we were on the right strategy actually. At the end of the race, Kenton did a good job, and I think we were in for a third-place finish, which would have been great for the championship. Then out of Turn 3 there was a slow GTP car you couldn’t get around. Kenton did a great job not making contact, but he lost the back of it and went off track and we went from P3 to P7 on the last lap of the race. It’s just frustrating because it was the slow GTP car just at the wrong place at the wrong time. Maybe we can learn something from that, how to deal with traffic, but really there was nothing that could have been done there. Next, we go to Virginia, hopefully we can have the same performance we had this weekend, and we will be without the GTP cars there.”
Kenton Koch, Driver – No. 32 Korthoff Preston Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3: “It started off well. Mik did a really good job, putting it up front and keeping it up front, and we did everything right in the pits. The strategy was good and put us in a position to be on the podium, but it is just frustrating when you’re on the final lap and a slow car with a mechanical issue comes out of pit lane. Coming out of Turn 3 on the last lap, I just wasn’t expecting him to not accelerate. I had to quickly lift to avoid hitting him after how fast we got on him. Had I known what he was going to do, I would’ve totally taken the corner completely differently. But hindsight is 20/20 and it’s frustrating for everyone because these guys really deserve more. We were on the podium in third place here last year, we came so close again, but it’s been one of those years. Hopefully we can come home with more in the future.”
Russell Ward, Driver – No. 57 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3: “It’s good that I’m at the same level and pace as the competition I am racing against. We can extend my driving stint and not sacrifice anything, and that’s what we did in Canada, and we did it here at Road America. It’s good and opens up some strategy options for us, but it was a tough race for us with the current GTD rules. We’ve won this race before and been fast here before, but it really just wasn’t our weekend. The crew did an incredible job as always, the car felt quite nice, but that was all we could do and the best we could do on Sunday. We drove flat out, that’s all we had, but there was really no chance to fend off the winner and some of the other cars. This is really competitive racing, and I’m not saying we have to be the fastest everywhere, but there needs to be some give and take in the rules. We just didn’t even have a chance at Road America, but our guys are incredible, they always get the most out of what we have, and I’m not disappointed about P4, which is about where we are.”
