The #6 Porsche 963 led a triumphant Porsche Penske Motorsport 1-2 at Laguna Seca after a down to the wire duel with the championship-leading sister car.
Porsche Penske Motorsport maintained its 100% win record in IMSA, taking its fourth victory in a row and a record of having both cars on the podium at every race.
But after the #7 Porsche 963 won the first three races of the season, it was Matt Campbell and Mathieu Jaminet’s turn to win in the #6 at the Laguna Seca IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race, after a thrilling fight between the two cars that went down to the last lap.
It was Felipe Nasr who got ahead out of the two cars on the opening lap and took the lead of the race during the first stint with an incredible overtake, but great strategy from the #6 put it ahead after the first pitstops.
Nick Tandy hunted down the car started by Campbell and now with Jaminet aboard in the final stint, but ultimately couldn’t get past.
The #7 car’s second-place finish means it has a 91-point championship lead after three wins and a second place so far this season.
With a third and two seconds coming into this race, the #6 has its first win since Road America in August last year, and goes back to back after winning last year’s Laguna Seca race with Jaminet and Tandy driving.
In customer racing, for the second race in a row Porsche added the GTD Pro class win, with reigning champions AO Racing dominating in Monterey and taking the lead of the championship with its 911 GT3 R (992).
Story of the race
At the race start, the #7 of Nasr made an impressive move on the #6 of Campbell at the first corner, and remained ahead in second for the rest of the first stint.
Nasr managed to reel in the leading #24 BMW, and took the lead with one of the overtakes of the season so far, dummying to the inside and then passing around the outside of Turn 5.
Just before Nasr took the lead, the #6 of Campbell slowed on track coming into the last corner with an issue that was quickly reset, but he dropped to fifth.
But an undercut strategy and a rapid pitstop and driver change by the Porsche Penske Motorsport squad meant the #6 emerged with a lead of over eight seconds at the head of the field.
Now in the #7, Tandy reduced that gap as Jaminet pitted for his second and final stop with 56 minutes to go.
Jaminet’s first flying lap after the stop was the fastest lap of the race, but Tandy elected to stay out to shorten the final stint pitting with 51 minutes to go.
Tandy almost spun exiting pitlane on cold tires trying to stay ahead of the #6 of Jaminet, but by Turn 5 Jaminet had made it through, and on hot tires, extended the gap to over six seconds.
However that wasn’t the end of the thrilling battle. Using a combination of speed and traffic, Tandy reeled in Jaminet with 36 minutes to go, under a second splitting the pair.
But Tandy was trapped by a rival a lap down for a lap which allowed Jaminet to escape and the #24 BMW to close in.
With five minutes to go they closed up again under traffic with the gap less than half a second again, but Jaminet was able to hold on as the #7 narrowly held on to take second in dramatic fashion during the 2-hour, 40-minute race.
The result means the #7 leads the championship over the #6 by 91 points. Porsche leads the manufacturer standings by an impressive 164 points.
The next race for Porsche Penske Motorsport is the 1h 40m Detroit street race on May 31. The next World Endurance Championship race of the team is at Le Mans on June 14-15.
There was one other 963 competing for the JDC Miller MotorSports team. The #85 driven by Gianmaria Bruni and Tijmen van der Helm ran as high as fourth, but ultimately as the varying strategies played out the car fell back to ninth at the finish.
GTD Pro
It doesn’t seem to matter who drives it, the #77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) is capable of winning any race in the IMSA series.
With Klaus Bachler behind the wheel alongside Laurin Heinrich, Bachler had a great start and jumped from fourth to second.
Like the GTP class there was a diversification of strategy between teams but with the first stops complete the #77 jumped from second to a massive 14 second lead.
Laurin Heinrich took over from Klaus Bachler’s first stint - where Bachler went from fourth to second - and pushed the lead to over 17s.
The car was quick enough to pit for a second and last time with just over an hour to go, emerging with a 14s lead.
It cruised home to take a 70-point lead in the championship after its Sebring win.
Like the #6 GTP entry, the #77 also secures back-to-back victories as it won at Laguna Seca last year.
The car has technically won three races in a row this season after Jonny Edgar and Laurens Vanthoor used the #77 at Long Beach where GTD Pro was not competing, and so it was entered as a one-off in GTD where it also won.
GTD
The #120 Wright Motorsports 911 GT3 R (992) was the only car in GTD this weekend and had worked forward impressively from its 10th place starting spot to sixth in the early running.
Unfortunately, it was then handed a penalty for contact with another competitor which shuffled it back.
Both Elliott Skeer and Adam Adelson showed impressive pace though, and were able to fight back up to that sixth position in the closing stages.
It means the team is third in the overall championship standings.
