IMSA racing at Mid-Ohio

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Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course opened its summer schedule for ticket-holders over the past weekend with a busy few days of on-track activity.

The main attraction for the weekend was the O’Reilly Auto Parts Four Hours of Mid-Ohio, which was held Sunday afternoon as part of the IMSA Michelin Pilot Series.

Winning the competition was the car driven by the duo of Aaron Telitz and Todd Coleman, whose Aston Martin Vantage GT4 representing Archangel Motorsports was one of 17 cars to complete 152 laps. They finished 4.533 laps in front of the second place team of Matt Plumb and Paul Holton. Running third was the team of Daniel Morad and Bryce Ward.

Those three cars were all part of the Grand Sport class in the 40-vehicle race. Also competing was the Touring Car class.

Winning that was the team of Preston Brown and Denis Dupont, who topped Tim Lewis and William Tally by just over four seconds to give the win to KMW Motorsports. Chris Miller and Mikey Taylor teamed up to place third in the TCR class. Those three cars ran 14th, 15th and 16th in the overall standings, respectively.

Three support series ran two races each over the weekend: VP Racing SportsCar Challenge, Whelen Mazda MX-5 Cup presented by Michelin and Mustang Challenge.

In the first 45-minute VP Racing SportsCar Challenge race, claiming the checkered flag was Jagger Jones, who finished 7.567 seconds in front of Steven Aghakhani. Taking third was Miguel Villagomez. Drivers competed in either the P3 or GSX classes, with those three drivers taking part in the P3 class.

Leading the GSX racers was Luca Mars, who took 10th overall. He was followed by Josh Green (11th) and Jesse Lazare (12th).

In the second race in that series, Jones won the P3 class and race again, with Aghakhani earning his second-straight runner-up. Seth Lucas took third. The same three GSX racers earned the podium again, but in a different order. This time, Lazare won and was 10th overall, while Green repeated in second (11th overall) and Mars was 12th overall and third in class.

The Mustang Challenge also contested of two classes. In the first race, the DH class and overall race was won by Robert Noaker. Sam Paley was second, trailing by just over six seconds, while Jeremy Fletcher took third place. The DHL class was won by Tom Tait, who was 12th overall. Mike Stillwagon (15th overall) and Mitch Marvosh (16th) also finished on the podium.

Tyler Maxson won the DH class and race in the second Mustang event, with Noaker finishing in second by .358 seconds. Fletcher repeated in third place.

For the DHL class, Zachry Lee claimed first place and was eighth overall, with Alex Bachoura (ninth) and Nicholas Smither (10th) also placing in the top three of the class.

In the MX-5 cup, the first race was won by Connor Zilisch, while Jared Thomas finished second, a mere .207 seconds behind. Third place went to Gresham Wagner, who was only .306 seconds out of the lead.

Wagner would earn the win in the second race by half a second over Jeremy Fletcher. Nate Cicero claimed third placed in the race to round out the podium finishers.

Rob Hamilton can be reached at 419-946-3010, ext. 1807. Connect with him on Twitter at @SportsMCS

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