IMSA: Continental Tire Road Race Showcase preview - MotorSportsTalk

The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship headlines a busy weekend across the board for IMSA series at Road America as a part of this weekend’s Continental Tire Road Race Showcase. Others on the calendar include the Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge, Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge USA by Yokohama and the Lamborghini Blancpain Super Trofeo North America series.

With the calendar now having flipped to August, this starts the beginning of the run to the end of the season for IMSA.

IMSA held three races in four weeks in July, at Watkins Glen International, Canadian Tire Motorsport Park and Lime Rock Park, and that’s helped shape the championship going into its final four weekends of the year – Road America this weekend, VIR at the end of the month, Circuit of The Americas in September and finally Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta the opening weekend in October.

Action Express Racing seized the momentum in the Prototype class following back-to-back wins at Watkins Glen and CTMP, albeit split one race each between its two Corvette DPs. Joao Barbosa and Christian Fittipaldi took the No. 5 Mustang Sampling car to the win at the Glen, before Dane Cameron and Eric Curran won at CTMP in the No. 31 Whelen Engineering/Team Fox for their first triumph of the season. It gives the No. 5 pair a four-point lead over the No. 31 pair (220-216). The Taylor brothers in the No. 10 Konica Minolta Corvette DP are nine points back (211).

Cameron and Curran won here last year in an AXR 1-2, and Fittipaldi and Barbosa won in 2014, so AXR seeks a Road America three-peat this weekend.

Hoping to stop them are the five other Prototype protagonists, the remaining Corvette DP from Visit Florida Racing, the pair of Mazda Prototypes, the No. 60 Michael Shank Racing Ligier JS P2 Honda and DeltaWing.

On the strength of three wins in the last four races, the No. 8 Starworks Motorsport Oreca FLM09 of Renger van der Zande and Alex Popow has gone out to a 17-point lead on Robert Alon and Tom Kimber-Smith in Prototype Challenge (PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports).

The PC grid has grown by two with a couple interesting additions. The third Starworks entry has Gustavo Yacaman in for Sean Rayhall along with Jose Gutierrez. Then BAR1 Motorsports expands to two cars; race defending winner Bruno Junqueira joins in the No. 20 car alongside Matt McMurry, with Johnny Mowlem moved to the second car (No. 26) alongside Don Yount.

GT Le Mans has been something of a roller coaster year depending on the Balance of Performance adjustments, but the points title is shaping up nicely between the No. 4 Corvette C7.R pairing (Oliver Gavin and Tommy Milner) and No. 67 Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GT (Ryan Briscoe and Richard Westbrook), each of whom has three wins. They’re separated by 10 points – 228 to 218.

The No. 911 Porsche 911 RSR of Patrick Pilet (defending class champion) and Nick Tandy has the other win, at Long Beach, while Ferrari is yet to win this year despite the pace of the new 488 GTE.

That pair won last year while Risi won in 2014, the SRT Viper won in 2013, and a BMW won in 2012.

In GT Daytona, Christina Nielsen and Alessandro Balzan have the top spot in the No. 63 Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488 GT3, at 212 points. The No. 44 Magnus Racing Audi R8 LMS pair of John Potter and Andy Lally are second on 199.

Hanging in but needing the No. 63 car to have an issue are three pairs separated by only two points in third to fifth. The No. 23 The Heart of Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R pair (Mario Farnbacher, Alex Riberas), defending Road America winners the No. 33 Riley Motorsports Dodge Viper GT3-R (Ben Keating, Jeroen Bleekemolen) and the No. 6 Stevenson Motorsports Audi R8 LMS (Andrew Davis, Robin Liddell) are on 187, 186 and 185 points, respectively.

Today’s also when IMSA rolls out the schedule and other platform announcements today for 2017, and that takes place at 11:45 a.m.

Tune-in info is below.

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An IndyCar executive said there is “absolutely” disappointment that its long-awaited video game recently was delayed beyond its target date, but the series remains optimistic about the new title.

“Well, I don’t know how quick it will be, but the whole situation is important to us,” Penske Entertainment president and CEO Mark Miles said during a news conference Monday morning to announce IndyCar’s NTT title sponsorship. “Motorsport Games has spent a lot of money, a lot of effort to create an IndyCar title. What we’ve seen of that effort, which is not completely obvious, is very reassuring.

“I think it’s going to be outstanding. That’s our shared objective, that when it is released, it’s just widely accepted. A great credit both to IndyCar racing, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, something that our fans love.”

In June 2021, IndyCar announced a new partnership with Motorsport Games to create and distribute an IndyCar video game for the PC and Xbox and PlayStation consoles in 2023.

But during an earnings call last week, Motorsport Games said the IndyCar game had been delayed to 2024 to ensure high quality.

Somewhat compounding the delay is that IndyCar’s license for iRacing expired after the end of the 2022 season because of its exclusive agreement with Motorsport Games.

That’s resulted in significant changes for IndyCar on iRacing, which had provided a high-profile way for the series to stay visible during its 2020 shutdown from the pandemic. (Players still can race an unbranded car but don’t race on current IndyCar tracks, nor can they stream).

That’s helped ratchet up the attention on having a video game outlet for IndyCar.

“I wish we had an IndyCar title 10 years ago,” said Miles, who has been working with the organization since 2013. “We’ve been close, but we’ve had these I think speed bumps.”

IndyCar is hopeful the Motorsports Game edition will be ready at the start of 2024. Miles hinted that beta versions could be unveiled to reporters ahead of the time “to begin to show the progress in a narrow way to make sure we’ve got it right, to test the progress so that we’re ready when they’re ready.”

It’s been nearly 18 years since the release of the most recent IndyCar video game for console or PC.

“(We) better get it right,” Miles said. “It’s something we’re very close to and continue to think about what it is to make sure we get it over the line in due course.”