· Program looking for fifth victory of 2021 IMSA season
· Team’s last race before return to 24 Hours of Le Mans
· Road America served as important venue for C8.R and Le Mans development

DETROIT (Aug. 3, 2021) – Corvette Racing is back at its spiritual home this weekend as it enters the second half of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. Historic and picturesque Road America is set to play host to Corvette Racing for the 20th time with the program searching for its ninth victory at the 4.048-mile, 14-turn road course.

Both of the team’s mid-engine Chevrolet Corvette C8.Rs will be in action for the two-hour, 40-minute race. Antonio Garcia and Jordan Taylor return as defending GT Le Mans (GTLM) race-winners in the No. 3 Mobil 1/SiriusXM Corvette C8.R. They are on a three-race winning streak and won last year’s GTLM Drivers Championship.

The first-year pairing of Tommy Milner and Nick Tandy reeled off consecutive runner-up finishes at Watkins Glen and Lime Rock Park, and they scored a victory in a non-points race at Detroit to start Corvette Racing’s summer swing.

Continuing that team momentum is as important as ever. Directly after Road America, Corvette Racing departs for France and its return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans. As is tradition, the team in May used Road America – with its long straights and sections of fast, flowing corners – to test and develop the Corvette C8.R’s low-downforce setup and aerodynamic package.

Road America also was the site of the first on-track test for the C8.R in 2018, another example of how Chevrolet continues to use the track to improve the Corvette brand… a practice that dates back more than 60 years.

Chevrolet on Display at Road America
Chevrolet’s ties with Road America will be evident all over the circuit, including the famed Corvette Bridge at Turn Six and the immersive Chevrolet Motorsports Display that will be open to fans throughout the weekend. Located at the top of the Midway near the Victory Podium, the Chevrolet Motorsports Display will be full of Chevrolet vehicles that spectators can learn more about during a busy event.

The Chevrolet Motorsports Display opens at 9 a.m. Friday plus 8:30 a.m. Saturday and Sunday. Numerous Chevrolet vehicles and other highlights include:

• A Corvette Racing C8.R showcar
• A 2022 Corvette Stingray IMSA GTLM Championship Edition coupe
• Additional Chevrolet products such as the Camaro Coupe 2SS, Blazer RS, Silverado Trail Boss, and Tahoe RST
• A special display with various Corvette Racing artifacts
• An opportunity to receive a Corvette T-shirt

In addition, the Chevrolet Stingray coupe will serve as Official Pace Vehicle for the Road America event’s premier races, including the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and Michelin Pilot Challenge.

Corvette Racing will contest the IMSA SportsCar Weekend on Aug. 6-8 from Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wis. Same-day coverage on NBCSN starts at 8 p.m. ET with live streaming coverage on TrackPass and NBC Sports Gold at 2:35 p.m. ET. Live audio coverage from IMSA Radio will be available on IMSA.com.

ANTONIO GARCIA, NO. 3 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “It’s good to have three weekends in a row ahead of Le Mans. Road America is good preparation for us to practice and compete, especially one week ahead of the Test Day. It will bring everyone up to speed and to be at 100 percent. It will be challenging for the team – being on one side of the world in a very competitive race and then fly halfway across the world to the most challenging race will do. Road America is the closest you can get to the speeds will run at Le Mans. That will be very helpful.”

JORDAN TAYLOR, NO. 3 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “Last year was an unexpected win. We weren’t in a great position but the way the race played out and the strategy calls we made were big. Antonio basically had to survive the last couple of laps in the rain to bring it home for the win. It was a huge day for the team with a 1-2 finish and for the 3 car in the championship. Since then, we’ve had a couple of tests there so we’ve learned some things to be more competitive when we do go back. Having that win last year really gave us some confidence.”

TOMMY MILNER, NO. 4 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “Road America will be a more important race than usual. It’s a place we typically go to for testing at Le Mans. We won’t run the cars there this week in the same test spec, but it will be our last real-world test of all our processes ahead of the Test Day and Le Mans itself. I imagine it will be a little bit more ramped up all weekend as we focus on that race, but also having an eye toward going to France a few days later. There are some challenges with that with the team having already sent some equipment and spares over. I don’t see that being a problem, but I’m sure there could be some heartburn for some of the guys if there are issues! We approach each race as its own isolated event but we have to look at the big picture, too. This will be a big weekend for sure.”

NICK TANDY, NO. 4 MOBIL 1/SiriusXM CHEVROLET CORVETTE C8.R: “The track at Road America is fantastic, the area is fantastic and the history of the circuit is phenomenal. There is some great stuff at Road America but there also are places where it’s a straight, 90-degree corner, straight and 90-degree corner. Having said that, it is one of those places where it’s so incredibly fast with no room for error in many places. Because of that, it’s an awesome lap when you have a car on the limit even if you are on your own. Some tracks when you are on your own, it’s not much fun and needs that racing aspect. A quick lap at Road America is different and a lot of fun.”

2021 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship – GTLM (After Five of 10 Events)
Driver Standings

1. Antonio Garcia/Jordan Taylor – 1,852
2. Tommy Milner/Nick Tandy – 1,661
3. Cooper MacNeil – 1,604
4. Augusto Farfus/Jesse Krohn/John Edwards – 1001
5. Mathieu Jaminet – 994

Team Standings

1. No. 3 Corvette Racing – 1,852
2. No. 4 Corvette Racing – 1,661
3. No. 79 WeatherTech Racing – 1,604
4. No. 24 BMW Team RLL – 1,001
5. No. 25 BMW Team RLL – 966

Manufacturer Standings

1. Chevrolet – 1,875
2. Porsche – 1,726
3. BMW – 1,052
4. Ferrari – 330

CORVETTE RACING AT ROAD AMERICA: By the Numbers
• 1: As in one team, one manufacturer and one model of car for 23 years: Corvette Racing, Chevrolet and the Chevrolet Corvette.
• 4: Generations of Corvette Racing entries at Road America since 2002 – Corvette C5-R (2002-2004), Corvette C6.R (2005-13), Corvette C7.R (2016-19) and Corvette C8.R (2020). Last year’s event was the first Road America race appearance for the mid-engine racing Corvette.
• 4: Number of cars Tommy Milner passed in the final 15 minutes of the 2016 Road America race. He and Oliver Gavin went on to win in class and capture the GTLM Drivers Championship.
• 8: Number of victories at Road America for Corvette Racing, the most of any entrant in IMSA.
• 8: Pole positions at Road America for Corvette Racing by four different drivers.
• 10: Number of drivers who have won races at Road America for Corvette Racing – Gavin (four); Olivier Beretta (three); Johnny O’Connell (two); and Kelly Collins, Ron Fellows, Antonio Garcia, Jan Magnussen, Milner, Andy Pilgrim and Jordan Taylor (one each).
• 11: Fastest race laps for Corvette Racing drivers at Road America. That includes one each for Milner (2019) and Garcia (2020).
• 13: Manufacturer Championships for Chevrolet and Corvette Racing since 2001.
• 20: Number of Road America events for Corvette Racing counting this year’s IMSA race.
• 25: Tracks at which Corvette Racing has won races – Baltimore, Charlotte Motor Speedway, COTA, Canadian Tire Motorsport Park/Mosport, Daytona, Detroit, Houston, Laguna Seca, Le Mans, Lime Rock, Long Beach, Miami, Mid-Ohio, Portland, Road America, Road Atlanta, Sebring, Sonoma, St. Petersburg, Texas, Trois Rivieres, Utah, VIR, Washington DC and Watkins Glen.
• 26: Number of GT Le Mans wins in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship for Corvette Racing since the start of 2014.
• 31: Number of drivers for Corvette Racing since 1999.
• 117: Victories worldwide for Corvette Racing – 109 in North America and eight at Le Mans.
• 244: Event starts by Corvette Racing since 1999.
• 11,561.14: Number of racing miles completed by Corvette Racing in its 19 previous trips to Road America. That represents 2,848 laps or more than 98 trips across Lake Michigan.
• 324,328.95: Total number of racing miles completed by Corvette Racing since its inception. To put that in perspective Apollo 13 – the longest manned spaceflight in history – covered “just” 248,655 miles. Simply put, the program has raced to the moon and back… and then some.

Corvette Racing at Road America (wins in bold)
2002
No. 3 Corvette C5-R: Ron Fellows/Johnny O’Connell/Oliver Gavin – 2nd in GTS (Fellows pole; Gavin fastest race lap)
No. 4 Corvette C5-R: Andy Pilgrim/Kelly Collins – 1st in GTS

2003
No. 3 Corvette C5-R: Ron Fellows/Johnny O’Connell – 2nd in GTS
No. 4 Corvette C5-R: Oliver Gavin/Kelly Collins – 5th in GTS (Gavin pole, fastest race lap)

2004
No. 3 Corvette C5-R: Ron Fellows/Johnny O’Connell – 2nd in GTS
No. 4 Corvette C5-R: Olivier Beretta/Oliver Gavin – 1st in GTS (Beretta pole, fastest race lap)

2005
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Ron Fellows/Johnny O’Connell – 2nd in GT1
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Oliver Gavin – 1st in GT1 (Gavin pole, Beretta fastest race lap)

2006
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Ron Fellows/Johnny O’Connell – 1st in GT1
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Oliver Gavin – 2nd in GT1 (Gavin fastest race lap)

2007
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Jan Magnussen/Johnny O’Connell – 2nd in GT1 (Magnussen pole, fastest race lap)
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Oliver Gavin – 1st in GT1

2008
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Johnny O’Connell/Jan Magnussen – 1st in GT1
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Oliver Gavin – 3rd in GT1 (Gavin pole, fastest race lap)

2009
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Jan Magnussen/Johnny O’Connell – 3rd in GT2
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Oliver Gavin – 6th in GT2

2010
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Johnny O’Connell – 4th in GT2
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Oliver Gavin/Jan Magnussen – 3rd in GT2 (Gavin pole, fastest race lap)

2011
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Olivier Beretta/Tommy Milner – 14th in GT
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Oliver Gavin/Jan Magnussen – 5th in GT

2012
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 6th in GT
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 4th in GT

2013
No. 3 Corvette C6.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 2nd in GT
No. 4 Corvette C6.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 3rd in GT

2014
No. 3 Corvette C7.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 6th in GTLM
No. 4 Corvette C7.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 7th in GTLM

2015
No. 3 Corvette C7.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 4th in GTLM
No. 4 Corvette C7.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 7th in GTLM

2016
No. 3 Corvette C7.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 6th in GTLM
No. 4 Corvette C7.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 1st in GTLM (5th to 1st in final 15 minutes)

2017
No. 3 Corvette C7.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 4th in GTLM
No. 4 Corvette C7.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 5th in GTLM

2018
No. 3 Corvette C7.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 3rd in GTLM (Garcia fastest race lap)
No. 4 Corvette C7.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 2nd in GTLM

2019
No. 3 Corvette C7.R: Jan Magnussen/Antonio Garcia – 4th in GTLM
No. 4 Corvette C7.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 6th in GTLM (Gavin pole, Milner fastest race lap)

2020
No. 3 Corvette C8.R: Antonio Garcia/Jordan Taylor – 1st in GTLM (Garcia fastest race lap)
No. 4 Corvette C8.R: Oliver Gavin/Tommy Milner – 2nd in GTLM
Team Chevy high-resolution racing photos are available for editorial use.

About Chevrolet
Founded in 1911 in Detroit, Chevrolet is now one of the world’s largest car brands, available in 79 countries with more than 3.2 million cars and trucks sold in 2020. Chevrolet models include electric and fuel-efficient vehicles that feature engaging performance, design that makes the heart beat, passive and active safety features and easy-to-use technology, all at a value. More information on Chevrolet models can be found at www.chevrolet.com.

August 2, 2021. DJ Kennington and the #17 Castrol Edge Dodge team expected to have a strong start to the 2021 NASCAR Pinty’s Series during the opening round this past Sunday at Sunset Speedway in Innisfil, Ontario. Kennington scored a second-place finish in the second of two 125-lap races at the 1/3-mile oval, however a part failure cost them a better result in race one.

During preseason testing the #17 Castrol Edge Dodge was quick at Sunset Speedway and in the early stages of race one, The First Responders 125 Kennington had no difficulty keeping up with the leaders.

The race was halted for several hours after only seven laps due to rain in the area. Once the action resumed Kennington continued his strong pace. However just before the midpoint of the race he suddenly lost power to the engine.

Diving to pitlane the #17 Castrol Edge Dodge team went to work and diagnosed the problem as faulty fuel pump. A straightforward issue to resolve, but race one was ruined “It was a brand-new part, just one of those quirky things that it failed” explained Kennington.

In the nightcap event, The General Tire 125, Kennington lined up third in the #17 Castrol Edge Dodge at the start and had plenty of pace to keep up with the other frontrunners runners.

In the closing laps Kennigton was running third in the #17 Castrol Edge Dodge when the second-place car spun out moving Kennington up one spot and setting up a two-lap dash to the finish. On the restart Kennington pushed as hard as he could but raced clean on the final two laps securing a second-place result.

“I got really close to the bumper of the leader but I’m not going to deliberately spin someone out” said Kennington after the race. “Great bounce back by the Castrol Edge Dodge team to fix the issues from race one. We got good result in race two and we expect to be running up front every week” he added.

“Thank you to all our supporters, Castrol, Spark Power coming on board with us this year. And of course, to all the fans that came out and for waiting out the rain delay” added Kennington.

TV & Live Streaming
Both races will be broadcast on TSN August 8, 1:00PM ET for race one and August 15, 11:00AMET for race two. RDS2 August 13, 9:30PM ET, August 23, 7:00PM ET

Race fans can follow DJ Kennington and the #17 Castrol Edge Dodge team on their official social media platforms:

Twitter www.twitter.com/@djkracing
Instagram www.instagram.com/djkracing
Website www.djkracing.ca
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/DJKenningtonRacing/

NASHVILLE, TENN. (2 August 2021) -Ready for a street fight? The Trans Am Series presented by Pirelli is more than ready.

When racing takes to the streets of Nashville for the Big Machine Vodka Spiked Coolers presents the Franklin Road Classic (August 6-8), it will be the latest chapter for Trans Am racing on a temporary layout. In fact through its long history, Trans Am has staged over 100 events on street circuits, airport runways, and even a city park.

The first Trans Am on a street course was in historic Trois-Rivieres, Quebec. The event served as the 1976 season finale, and George Follmer gave future star Al Holbert a driving lesson to bring home the season championship. That was the first of 22 Trans Ams at the Canadian layout – more than any other temporary circuit.

The most recent road race for the series was at Belle Isle Park, located in a county park in the Detroit River, with Canada on the south and the United States to the north. Trans Am raced there 21 times, most recently in 2019 for a double-feature when Tony Ave drove to victory in his 100th Trans Am race and IMSA’s Misha Goikhberg opened the weekend with a win.
Running in partnership with Championship Auto Racing Teams and its successor Champ Car, Trans Am races were a staple of the open-wheel weekends on temporary courses from the late 1980s through the beginning of the 2000s. The series hosted eight street races in both 1990 and 1996; in 2005, seven of the nine Trans Am weekends were on temporary layouts.

Paul Gentilozzi is the most successful driver on the streets, winning 18 races. Tommy Kendall is second with 14 victories, followed by Ron Fellows with 10; Scott Pruett with nine; and Irv Hoerr and Scott Sharp with six each. Occasional TA competitor Boris Said could break a tie with fellow five-time winner Dorsey Schroeder with a victory at Nashville. Said also won the closest race, beating Greg Pickett by 0.147-seconds in 2005 on the bumpy layout in San Jose, California.

Though Ave is entered for the Music City Grand Prix, his first entry of the season, Adam Andretti is the only active driver with a TA2 street course victory.

“That is quite an honor to be taking that statistic into the Music City Grand Prix,” said Andretti. “That day in Detroit was very special for sure, however I don’t think with a brand new layout for every competitor in Nashville that it brings me any advantage in my Peterson Racing Ford Mustang so to speak. Our family always carries a lot of confidence in street races and that is no different for me. My brother John had great success on street courses and my uncle Mario and cousin Michael had amazing records on the streets. Great success doesn’t come without a great team behind you and with Peterson Racing I know I’m there with the very best! With the large entry list the strategy I believe for all of us competitors will be stay clean so we can get as many green flag laps possible and put on a great show for the fans.”

Trans Am raced 14 times in the marquee event at Long Beach, California. It visited St. Petersburg, Florida nine times on three different layouts. Other memorable layouts included Caesar’s Palace in Las Vegas; Tamiami and Bayfront parks in Miami; the parking lots of RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C., and Giants Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands; Niagara Falls, New York; and Isla Gran de Airport in San Juan, Puerto Rico, to end the 2003 campaign.

The Trans Am Series presented by Pirelli TA2® drivers will participate in one practice on Friday August 6 (2:15 p.m. CT), before the morning split qualifying sessions starting at 11:15 a.m. Central on Saturday. The Big Machine Vodka Spiked Coolers presents the Franklin Road Classic will go green on Saturday afternoon at 1:45 p.m. Central. Trans Am will announce how to watch the 100-mile Nashville sprint in the upcoming days.

For more event information, visit www.gotransam.com

McClure Finished Second on Sunday; Pedro Torres Earned a Top Five With Rob Lorndale and Jordan Wallace Scoring Top Ten Class Finishes

ELKHART LAKE, Wisconsin (August 2, 2021) – TPC Racing saw their four-car Porsche Sprint Challenge North America effort rewarded with strong finishes from each driver this past weekend, topped by Vernon McClure’s hard-fought second-place finish on Sunday at Road America.

McClure drove the No. 101 Main Street Homes/TPC Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup to the runner-up position overall and in the Platinum Cup during Sunday’s 40-minute sprint race, holding the finish despite a one-lap dash to the checkered flag after a late caution.

That caution was the second of the race and set McClure up for one last challenge after following the leader from the opening lap. McClure went side by side with a competitor going hard on the brakes going into turn five and came through turn six still in position for the podium.

The silver medal came just one day after narrowly missing the podium with a fourth-place finish.

“I barely missed it yesterday,” McClure said. “I feel bad for Dave Brule, he got inside of me and just went off in turn five. It was great racing, I love racing with these guys. I wish we didn’t have that last yellow flag, I was checked out a little bit. But it was good. I love this track, Road America is just awesome. TPC Racing is awesome to work with. My coach, Spencer Pumpelly, kept me going. It was just a lot of fun.”

Pedro Torres’ Saturday race was equally as impressive. Coming through turn three in the No. 16 Stoneleaf/TPC Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup on the opening lap, Torres spun to avoid a car further up the grid that had done the same. In doing so, he fell all the way to the back of the 38-car field, then began a charge back to the front. At the checkered flag, Torres was fifth in the Gold Cup class, and 12th overall. He followed that up with a sixth-place finish on Sunday.

Rob Lorndale, driving the No. 6 TPC Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup, finished a strong seventh during Saturday’s race and earned a second top-10 with a 10th place finish on Sunday. Jordan Wallace finished two laps down on Saturday in the No. 35 Dasbold/TPC Racing Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport, but rebounded for a 10th-place finish of his own on Sunday. Both Lorndale and Wallace are in their first season of professional-level racing, holding their own and improving each event with TPC Racing.

Both Torres and Lorndale stuck around for the 65-minute charity race held on the Porsche Sprint Challenge weekends, finishing second and third in the Gold class and third and fourth overall, respectively, and donating to the Racing For Children’s charity to fight childhood cancer. Lorndale began the race before handing his car to Director of Race Operations, Harris Levitas, to run to the finish.

“That was a great weekend for all of us here at TPC Racing,” Levitas said. “We were able to bring all the cars home cleanly, and we got some great, great results throughout the weekend. Each one of our guys got better as the weekend went along, and I’m really happy for Vernon, Pedro and Rob, because they have podium photos to prove it. Each of the four are already thinking about getting back in the car and had a lot of fun, so that’s really what it’s all about.”

The Porsche Sprint Challenge North America returns to action for the point championship at Watkins Glen International, September 17-19. McClure and TPC Racing, along with the team’s Lamborghini Sterling/Erin Levitas Foundation Lamborghini Huracan Evo driven by Scott Schmidt and Trevor Andrusko in Lamborghini Super Trofeo, will run at Road America this coming weekend, August 6-8.

About TPC Racing:
TPC Racing is the Mid-Atlantic’s premier maintenance, service, tuning and modification center dedicated solely to Porsche sportscars. TPC Racing specializes in R&D and sales of high-performance modifications for Porsche sports cars and race cars, offering a wide range of vehicle upgrades. Best known for a line of forced induction solutions for the Porsche 911, Cayman and Boxster, a long-time focus on only one make, Porsche, has enabled TPC Racing to become experts in Porsche service, tuning, and racing. In 2000, TPC Racing began entering races under its own banner, scoring an SGS-class Championship in 2004 in the Grand-American Rolex Series and was a class winner in the 2006 Rolex 24 At Daytona, and captured the 2013 and 2016 IMSA Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA Gold Cup Championships. More information can be found at www.TPCRacing.com.

ELKHART LAKE, Wis. (Aug. 2, 2021) – It’s been 11 weeks since the Idemitsu Mazda MX-5 Cup presented by BFGoodrich® Tires was last on track. The wait for the Alana Long 100 at Road America has only heightened the championship suspense, with the top three separated by only 250 points.

With eight of the 2021 season’s 14 races in the books, 2020 Mazda MX-5 Cup Champion Michael Carter (No. 08 Carter Racing Enterprises) leads the points heading to Wisconsin.

In the most recent event at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course, Carter had a tough weekend without a podium finish, but managed to still keep his points lead. However, his advantage is down to just 40 points ahead of Gresham Wagner (No. 5 Spark Performance).

Neither Carter nor Wagner have won at Road America in MX-5 Cup before. But the man sitting third in the championship, Selin Rollan (No. 87 Hixon Motor Sports) has. He is 250 points behind Carter, an easily surmountable gap considering each race offers a maximum of 380 points.

As we race into the second half of the season, Carter doesn’t plan on letting any thoughts of championship points affect his performance.

“I don’t let points factor into my decision making on track,” Carter said. “I go out there and do the best I can and let everything else work itself out.”

As the longest track (4.048 miles) on the Idemitsu Mazda MX-5 Cup schedule, Road America offers up some of the best drafting battles of the season. Fans can expect a race similar to Daytona with long lines of cars running nose-to-tail.

“Road America is so draft dependent in our cars that the only real way to get a competitive lap time is finding a draft,” Rollan said. “That would either be with a teammate or another group of cars you have to mooch off of.”

The length of the circuit also plays a large role in the mental chess game happening in each driver’s head.

“You definitely need to plan ahead, because a mis-timed move could cost you three, four or five places with the long straights,” Wagner said. “It’s definitely necessary to plan your moves out to keep your momentum up on the runs down the straightaway.”

Many past MX-5 Cup races at Road America have ended with cars drag racing up the hill from Turn 14 to the finish line on the last lap. That begs the question: do you want to be leading the race on the final lap?

“I think that comes to how your car has behaved in the race and how confident you are with your speed through the middle part of the track,” Wagner said. “If your car is working well through there you can outdrive the draft and hopefully have some battling behind you and have a small gap going onto the back straight that you can hang on to.”

Carter has a simpler approach.

“I’m just going to see where I end up when the white flag comes out and go from there,” he said.

Chris Nunes (No. 32 JTR Motorsports Engineering), who is fourth in the points, is coming off of a breakthrough first Mazda MX-5 Cup race win. He is followed in the points by two more rookies knocking on the door of their first race win; Sam Paley (No. 28 McCumbee McAleer Racing) is fifth, Luca Mars (No. 41 Copeland Motorsports) is sixth.

All rookies are competing for the $80,000 career advancement scholarship from Mazda for the Rookie of the Year, but they are also mathematically close enough in the points to take home the grand prize of $200,000 for the series champion.

Road America has been a mainstay on the Mazda MX-5 Cup racing calendar since the series began in 2006. To date, MX-5 Cup has held 20 races at the legendary road course. Since 2019, the doubleheader at Road America has been titled the Alana Long 100 in honor of the matriarch of the Long Road Racing family, a longtime partner of the MX-5 Cup series. Alana lost her battle with cancer in April of 2019. Road America was her favorite track.

Race 1 of the Alana Long 100 weekend goes green Friday, August 6 at 2:25pm CT. Race 2 is set for Saturday, August 7, at 10:30am CT. Both races will be available live on imsa.com/tvlive.

About: The Idemitsu Mazda MX-5 Cup presented by BFGoodrich® Tires is the signature spec series for Mazda Motorsports. Mazda-powered grassroots champions earn a Mazda scholarship to advance their career. The Idemitsu Mazda MX-5 Cup champion earns a $250,000 scholarship.

Find out more at http://www.mx-5cup.com.