AXR’s Aitken, Bamber Take Controlling Detroit Win

Photo: Mike Levitt/IMSA

Action Express Racing broke through for its first IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship victory of the season, with Earl Bamber and Jack Aitken taking a controlling win in Saturday’s Chevrolet Detroit Sports Car Classic.

Aitken drove the No. 31 Cadillac V-Series.R to a 6.023-second win over the No. 25 Team WRT BMW M Hybrid V8 of Philipp Eng in the 100-minute race that saw two late-race yellow and restarts.

The Whelen Engineering-sponsored Cadillac led from the start, thanks to an ideal getaway from pole-sitter Bamber, who stretched out into an early lead over the No. 93 Meyer Shank Racing Acura ARX-06 of Nick Yelloly, as the No. 40 Wayne Taylor Racing Cadillac of Louis Deletraz dropped back to fourth.

A mid-race stop, where the No. 31 Cadillac took on fresh right-side Michelin tires, kept Aitken out front for the remainder of the contest.

With the win, Aitken took over the GTP points lead, following a race to forget for the No. 5 JDC-Miller Motorsports Porsche 963 of Laurin Heinrich, whose car served multiple penalties, including a stop-and-hold plus 60-second infraction for pinching the No. 23 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Valkyrie of Roman De Angelis into the wall.

Heinrich entered the weekend with the championship lead after winning three of the first four races between two Porsche entries. The Porsche factory driver and co-pilot Tijmen van der Helm finished 11th, last in GTP.

Both Eng’s co-driver Marco Wittmann, as well as the third-placed finishing No. 10 WTR Cadillac and No. 6 Penske Porsche of Kevin Estre, ran long before making their first-and-only pit stops, which ultimately put them ahead of the No. 93 MSR Acura of Renger van der Zande on track.

However, a miscue for Laurens Vanthoor, who was attempting to overtake Eng for second in Turn 3 for second position with 26 minutes to go, dropped the No. 6 Porsche out of a podium result.

Then a damaged rear wing and diffuser after contact from his brother, Dries, in the No. 24 BMW, led to a mechanical black flag for the elder Vanthoor. The No. 6 Porsche came home eighth after making a rear-deck change while under yellow.

Dries Vanthoor was handed drive-through penalty for incident responsibility, which was served just seconds before the third and final yellow and resulted in an ninth place result.

Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque, meanwhile, cruised to a season-best third place finish, staying out of trouble for a clean run.

Van der Zande capitalized on the brothers Vanthoor incident to finish fourth, with Julien Andlauer completing the top-five in the No. 7 Penske Porsche, after his co-driver Felipe Nasr ran into the No. 60 MSR Acura of Tom Blomqvist in the opening laps.

It resulted in a mechanical black flag for Blomqvist, and subsequent debris that led to the race’s first caution. Blomqvist, who got back behind the wheel of the No. 60 car after an early hand-off to Colin Braun, finished seventh.

Garcia, Sims Win GTD Pro Amid Late-Race Carnage For Rest of Class

GTD Pro class honors went to the No. 3 Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R of Alexander Sims and Antonio Garcia, in a similar dominant flag-to-flag run to the overall-winning Cadillac.

Garcia finished 1.935 seconds ahead of the second-placed No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Lamborghini Temerario GT3 of Andrea Caldarelli, who scored the first podium finish for the new-for-2026 car in highly unlikely fashion.

The No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 of Jack Hawksworth looked set to come home second until he passed Garcia for the class lead while under the race’s last yellow, surrendered the position per the request of race control, then was hit with a drive-through penalty for incident responsibility on the restart.

That promoted Nicky Catsburg, in the sister No. 4 Corvette, to second until he appeared to slow on track and get rammed by the No. 15 Vasser Sullivan Lexus of Aaron Telitz. The Dutchman was given a drive-through for incident responsibility.

Telitz, with heavy right-front damage, was then forced into the pits and given a 60-second post-race time penalty for running the red light at pit-out. The No. 15 Lexus was the race’s only retirement.

It opened the door for Caldarelli to snatch an unlikely runner-up class result in the car started by fellow Lamborghini factory driver Sandy Mitchell.

Chris Mies, who was forced into the pits with 45 minutes to go while running second in class after contact between Hawksworth and Catsburg that damaged the No. 64 Multimatic Motorsports-run Ford Mustang GT3 EVO’s right-front wheel, somehow managed to emerge in third at the checkered flag.

The German driver made a last-gasp pass on the No. 1 Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 EVO of Connor De Phillippi for the final podium position.

The sister No. 65 Mustang GT3 EVO was classified in fifth, ahead of the penalized Hawksworth and Catsburg entries, in sixth and seventh, respectively.

Nick Tandy, who slammed his No. 77 AO Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo into the Turn 5 barriers to bring out the final yellow with 11 minutes to go, was ninth in class after being one several GTD Pro cars to pit early on an alternative strategy that ultimately didn’t pan out.

RESULTS: Chevrolet Detroit Sports Car Classic

Source: Sports Car 365