The 2018 Northeast Grand Prix was a sports car race sanctioned by the

International Motor Sports Association The International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) is a North American sports car racing sanctioning body based in Daytona Beach, Florida under the jurisdiction of the ACCUS arm of the FIA. It was started by John Bishop, a former executive direc ...

(IMSA). The race was held at

Lime Rock Park Lime Rock Park is a natural-terrain motorsport road racing venue located in Lakeville, Connecticut, United States, a hamlet in the town of Salisbury, in the state's northwest corner. Built in 1956, it is the nation's third oldest continuously ope ...

Lakeville, Connecticut Lakeville is a census-designated place (CDP) in Litchfield County, Connecticut, United States, close to Dutchess County, New York. It is within the town of Salisbury, but has its own ZIP Code (06039). As of the 2010 census, the population of Lak ...

, on July 21, 2018. The race was the eighth round of the

2018 IMSA SportsCar Championship The 2018 IMSA SportsCar Championship was the 48th motor racing championship sanctioned by the International Motor Sports Association (IMSA) (which traces its lineage to the 1971 IMSA GT Championship). It was the fifth season of the United Sport ...

Background

's (IMSA) president Scott Atherton confirmed the race was part of the schedule for the

(IMSA SCC) in August 2017. It was the fourth consecutive year the event was held as part of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and the twenty-seventh annual running of the race. The 2018 Northeast Grand Prix was the eighth of twelve scheduled sports car races of 2018 by IMSA, and was the fifth round not held on the held as part of the North American Endurance Cup. The race was held at the seven-turn

on July 21, 2018. The race was the first of two GT-only rounds on the 2018 IMSA calendar, in which the prototype class, Prototype (P), would not be taking part. After the SportsCar Grand Prix 1 week earlier,

Ryan Briscoe Ryan Briscoe (born 24 September 1981) is an Australian-American professional racing driver from Sydney who has predominantly raced open-wheel and sports cars in Europe and America. In IndyCar he collected 8 wins and 28 podiums, finishing third ...

and

Richard Westbrook Richard Westbrook (born 10 July 1975) is a British professional racing driver noted for his success in racing Porsche and International sports cars. As a junior, he attended St Joseph's College, Ipswich. He has won both the Porsche Supercup i ...

led the GTLM Drivers' Championship with 181 points, ahead of Antonio García and

Jan Magnussen Jan Ellegaard Magnussen (born 4 July 1973) is a Danish professional racing driver and was a factory driver for General Motors until the end of the 2020 season. He has competed in Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART), NASCAR, the FIA Formula ...

with 175 points, and

Joey Hand Joseph F. Hand (born February 10, 1979) is an American professional racing driver who competes in sports car racing as a Ford factory driver. A former champion of the Star Mazda Series, Hand is the co-winner of the 2011 24 Hours of Daytona drivin ...

and Dirk Müller with 173 points. In GTD, the Drivers' Championship was led by

Bryan Sellers Bryan Sellers (born August 19, 1982 in Daytona Beach, Florida, Dayton, Ohio) is an American racing driver. Sellers won the title in the U.S. F2000 National Championship, U.S. F2000 in 2002 and later competed in the Atlantic Championship and in r ...

and

Madison Snow Madison Snow (born December 26, 1995) is an American racing driver who currently competes in the IMSA SportsCar Championship. In 2018 Snow became only the second driver in IMSA history to win two championships in the same year, winning both the W ...

with 183 points, ahead of

Katherine Legge Katherine Anne Legge ( ; born 12 July 1980) is a British professional auto racing driver, competing in the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. She is also featured in ''Richard Hammond's Crash Course''. Racing career Early racing and Atlantics ...

with 180 points.

Ford Ford commonly refers to: * Ford Motor Company, an automobile manufacturer founded by Henry Ford * Ford (crossing), a shallow crossing on a river Ford may also refer to: Ford Motor Company * Henry Ford, founder of the Ford Motor Company * Ford F ...

and

Lamborghini Automobili Lamborghini S.p.A. () is an Italian brand and manufacturer of luxury sports cars and SUVs based in Sant'Agata Bolognese. The company is owned by the Volkswagen Group through its subsidiary Audi. Ferruccio Lamborghini (1916–1993) ...

were leading their respective Manufacturers' Championships, while the #67

Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Chip Ganassi Racing, LLC (CGR), also sometimes branded as Chip Ganassi Racing Teams, is an American auto racing organization with teams competing in the NTT IndyCar Series, IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, FIA World Endurance Championshi ...

led the GTLM Teams' Championship.

Paul Miller Racing Paul Miller Racing is an American auto racing team that is part of Paul Miller Auto Group and associated with former racing driver . The team has operations that are headquartered in Buford, Georgia; the Racing team also has operations in Par ...

were leading the GTD Teams' Championship. On July 12, 2018, IMSA issued the latest technical bulletin outlining Balance of Performance for the event. In GTLM, The

BMW M8 GTE The BMW M8 GTE is an endurance grand tourer (GT) car constructed by the German automobile manufacturer BMW. It was developed in late 2016 and made its competitive début in IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and FIA WEC for the 2018 season, ...

received an increase in turbo boost and a fuel capacity increase of one liter. In GTD, the

Lexus RC F GT3 The Lexus RC (Japanese: レクサス・RC, ''Rekusasu RC'') is a Compact executive car, compact executive two-door coupé manufactured by Lexus, Toyota's luxury division. The RC which according to Lexus stands for "Radical Coupe" is a two-door co ...

and Mercedes AMG GT3 were given weight increases of 15 and 10 kilograms, respectively.

Entries

A total of 18 cars took part in the event split across 2 classes. 8 cars were entered in GTLM, and 10 in GTD. In GTD, Wright Motorsports withdrew its #16 entry after Michael Schein had a scheduling conflict.

Mario Farnbacher Mario Farnbacher (born 14 May 1992) is a German racecar driver who currently competes in the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. Career file:GT Masters Porsche 911 GT3 R Farnbacher.jpg, 255px, Farnbacher competing at the Nürburgring in 2012 In ...

replaced

David Heinemeier Hansson David Heinemeier Hansson is a Denmark, Danish programmer, and the creator of the popular Ruby on Rails web development Software framework, framework and the Instiki, Instiki wiki. He is also a partner at the web-based software development firm B ...

in the #15

3GT Racing 3GT Racing is an American racing team formed by Paul, Tony and John Gentilozzi. 3GT will compete at the 2017 IMSA SportsCar Championship with two Lexus RC F GT3 under the brand 3GT Racing, with Scott Pruett and Sage Karam as two of the drivers. Te ...

entry.

Gunnar Jeannette Gunnar Jeannette (born May 5, 1982 in West Palm Beach, Florida) is an American racing driver who competes in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship for WeatherTech Racing. He won the 2011 American Le Mans Series season LMPC Drivers' Champio ...

returned to the #63

Scuderia Corsa Scuderia Corsa is an American automotive racing team with teams competing in the IMSA SportsCar Championship, Pirelli World Challenge and Ferrari Challenge in North America. Founded in 2012 by Giacomo Mattioli and Art Zafiropoulo, the team has t ...

entry.

Practice

There were three practice sessions preceding the start of the race on Saturday, all three on Friday. The first one-hour session was on Friday morning while the second and third sessions were on Friday afternoon.

Practice 1

The first practice session took place at 11:25 am ET on Friday and ended with Dirk Müller topping the charts for

, with a lap time of 50.924.

Practice 2

The second practice session took place at 1:55 pm ET on Friday and ended with Antonio García topping the charts for

Corvette Racing Corvette Racing is an American auto racing team established in 1999 by General Motors and Pratt & Miller for the purposes of competing in sports car racing internationally. Corvette Racing is an official racing program for General Motors and th ...

, with a lap time of 50.939.

Practice 3

The third and final practice session took place at 4:55 pm ET on Friday and ended with

Nick Tandy Nick Tandy (born 5 November 1984) is a professional British racing driver currently racing for Corvette Racing in the FIA World Endurance Championship in the 64 Corvette C8.R. His major victories include the 2015 24 Hours of Le Mans, the 2015 ...

topping the charts for Porsche GT Team, with a lap time of 50.414.

Qualifying

Saturday morning's 40-minute qualifying session was divided into two groups. Both categories had 15-minute individual sessions, and regulations stipulated teams to nominate a single driver to qualify their cars. The competitors' fastest lap times determined the starting order with the grid arranged to put the GTLM cars ahead of all GTD entries.

Qualifying results

Pole positions In a motorsports race, the pole position is usually the best and "statistically the most advantageous" starting position on the track. The pole position is usually earned by the driver with the best qualifying times in the trials before the rac ...

in each class are indicated in bold and by . * The No. 33 Mercedes-AMG Team Riley Motorsport entry was moved to the back of the GTD field after the team elected to change tires after qualifying.

Race

Post-race

As a result of winning the race, Hand and Müller took the lead of the GTLM Drivers' Championship. Briscoe and Westbrook dropped from first to third while Bamber and Vanthoor advanced from fifth to fourth. The result kept Sellers and Snow atop the GTD Drivers' Championship with 218 points, 10 points ahead of Legge. Ford, and Lamborghini continued to top their respective Manufacturers' Championships while Paul Miller Racing kept their advantage in the GTD Teams' Championship. The #66 Ford Chip Ganassi Racing entry took the lead of the GTLM Teams' Championship with four rounds remaining.

Results

Class winners are denoted in bold and .

Standings after the race

* Note: Only the top five positions are included for all sets of standings. * Note: Only the top five positions are included for all sets of standings. * Note: Only the top five positions are included for all sets of standings.

References

{{Northeast Grand Prix

Northeast Grand Prix The Northeast Grand Prix (until 2006: New England Grand Prix) is a professional sports car race held at Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut, United States as part of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. Previous editions of the Gran ...