ALMS Lime Rock Park, CT 18 July 2009

Big crowd, great races at Lime Rock Park



18 Jul 2009



It was a beautiful, and very full, racing day at Lime Rock Park for the American Le Mans Series Northeast Grand Prix. A big crowd filled the outside and inside hillside spectator areas, and they were treated to another exciting ALMS race.



For the second year in a row, there was a late-race change of the lead. Last year, the Scott Sharp/David Brabham team scored the win with a last-lap pass. This year, they were leading with about 15 minutes to go when their Acura ARX 02a suffered a left-rear puncture and that handed the lead and the win to the polesitting team of Gil de Ferran and Simon Pagenaud in another Acura. Finishing an impressive third was the hybrid gas-electric Ginetta-Zytek 09HS LMP1 driven by Johnny Mowlem and Stefan Johansson.



Winning the LMP2 class (fourth overall) were Butch Leitzinger and Marino Franchitti (Darios brother) in the Lola-Mazda B09 86, ahead of Luis Diaz and Adrian Fernandez in their Acura ARX-01B.



In GT2, Pat Long and Joerg Bergmeister had the measure of the field in their Porsche 911 RSR, besting the Ferrari 430 GT of Jaime Melo and Pierre Kaffer. The Porsche was an outstanding fifth overall.



The special ALMS Challenge class a fleet of Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars was won by Wesley Hoagland and Bob Faiata.



In the other races at Lime Rock Park, Simona De Silvestro won the Cooper Tires Atlantic Championship powered by Mazdaevent, Joel Feinberg took race one and Gary Gibson race two in the Frisby Tires IMSA Lites series, while in Formula BMW, Gabby Chaves won the first race and James Kovacic the second.