Taylor and Casey give Audi the first win of the season

Another hectic finish of the TCR class in the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge saw Mikey Taylor and Britt Casey jr. driving their JDC-Miller Motorsports Audi RS 3 LMS to an amazing victory at Bowmanville. The first of the season for the German make.
Just like it had happened last week at Watkins Glen, the final part of the two-hour race completely reshuffled the ranking.
Taylor and Miller built a comfortable lead in the first part of the race, until a messy pit stop and the resulting drive-through penalty dropped them down the order. The second JDC-Miller Audi driven by Michael Johnson and Stephen Simpson was handed the first position and it was in a close fight with the Roadshagger Racing Audi of Jonathan Morley and Gavin Ernstone. Behind them the two Hyundai cars of Michael Lewis-Mark Wilkins and Harry Gottsacker-Mason Filippi, the Honda Civic of Colin Mullan-Max Faulkner and the Alfa Romeo Giulietta of Alex Popow-Alexandre Papadopulos were fighting for the third position.
Twenty minutes before the end, Wilkins had a lengthy pit stop, the sister Hyundai of Gottsacker went off, Popow parked his Alfa Romeo alongside the track and Mullan hit the tyre wall and pitted for repairs. After a brief safety car intervention, there was a five-way fight for the lead between the Audi cars of Simpson, Morley and Casey and the Honda cars of Lamb and Mullan. There were clashes and mistakes, positions swapped several times and eventually Taylor overtook Simpson for the lead with three minutes left on the clock. Then Simpson clashed with Morley who went wide and this promoted Mullan to second, while Morley recovered the third position ahead of Lamb.
Tom O’Gorman and Shelby Blackstock retained the leadership in the standings despite their Honda Civic was stopped by a technical failure after three laps. However, their advantage has shrunk to only five points over Ernstone-Morley and six over Lewis-Wilkins.
The next round will be at Lime Rock on July 19/20.

Race
1. JDC-Miller Motorsports, Audi RS 3 LMS (Casey jr. / Taylor), 78 laps
2. LA Honda World Racing, Honda Civic FK7 (Mullan / Faulkner), 3.854
3. Roadshagger Racing, Audi RS 3 LMS (Morley / Ernstone), 4.515
4. Atlanta Speedwerks, Honda Civic FK7 (Lamb / Henderson), 6.414
5. JDC-Miller Motorsports, Audi RS 3 LMS (Johnson / Simpson), 33.814

Championship points
1. O’Gorman-Blackstock 139 pts; 2. Ernstone-Morley 134; 3. Lewis-Wilkins 133