Compass Racing wins again at Sebring
After winning the TCR class in the opening round of the IMSA Continental Tire Sportscar Challenge at Daytona, Compass Racing encored, claiming victory at Sebring.
However, it was a bittersweet success for the team. After starting from the pole position and leading the majority of the race, the No. 77 Audi RS3 LMS of Daytona winners Tom Long and Britt Casey Jr. slowed on course coming to the chequered flag, preventing the duo from achieving their second win in as many races.
Their misfortune paved the way for their teammates, Kuno Wittmer and Rodrigo Sales to claim their first TCR victory in the No. 74 Audi. The win was a series first for Sales, who is in the midst of his rookie season in the series, while it’s the second victory for Wittmer, who returned to the series for the first time in three years.
“I feel terrible for my own teammates,” said Wittmer. “If it was any other TCR, I wouldn’t care, but I feel terrible because they had pace, they qualified on pole and they deserved to be there. Unfortunately, they didn’t even get a result at the end, but we’ll take it. I mean, this is a championship, you fight tooth and nail for it, there’s a lot invested, a lot of work by the team and if you look at the way our weekend has developed, we missed Practice 1, Practice 2 and we barely made it to FP3. We qualified well, but we had no practice. We just stayed in it. We stayed patient and we kept fighting, fighting, fighting.”
Another Audi finished on the podium in third – the No. 10 of Kieron O’Rourke and Lee Carpentier for eEuroparts.com Racing – but Volkswagen prevented its podium sweep. Finishing runner-up were brothers Tanner and Luke Rumberg in the No. 31 Volkswagen Golf GTI for Rumcastle LLC in just their second Continental Tire Challenge start. The Tanners crossed the line with a slim three-tenth margin ahead of O’Rourke-Carpentier.
The third round of the IMSA Continental Tire Sportscar Challenge will be at Mid-Ohio on May 6th.
Picture: IMSA
