ALMS: St Petersburg lap by lap report

[Plex]

The second round of the American Le Mans Series took place on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida. Planetlemans.com saw the action and made the following lap-by-lap report for you. Mind you, it was an eventful race with loads of bills to be paid for new (spare) parts and repairs.

Lap 1: Green flag! McNish forces his way through. Audi and Penske Porsche touch, parts fly. McNish takes the lead. Several cars braking hard in turn 1, Franchitti slides through and takes second place.

Lap 2: #7 Porsche suffers a right rear puncture. Ross Smith puts his Panoz in the wall. McNish gets black flagged for jumping the start. #7 (Dumas) in pit for new tyres.

Lap 3: McNish does his drive through, Franchitti inherits the lead. Ross Smith continues his race.

Lap 7: Franchitti goes wide, hits the wall and damages the rear wing, but he stays on track and keeps the lead.

Lap 9: Briscoe in the #6 Penske comes into the pit for an unscheduled pitstop. High oil and water temperatures on the screen, the cause of the 'problem' is not found.

Lap 13: Franchitti is still in the lead. The Audi�s are 2-3 already. McNish is flying and is closing in on Franchitti over a second a lap.

Lap 17: McNish closes in big time. Over 3 seconds quicker than Franchitti on the last lap.

Lap 19: Impressive run by McNish, overcoming a drive-through he passes the Acura of Franchitti with no problems.

Lap 25: Ben Devlin stalls the car on the same place Franchitti hits the wall. Is able to put the car in reverse and rejoins the race, loses a lot of time.

Lap 27: Despite rejoining the race Devlin stalls the car on the track.Electronical problems halts the car.

Lap 29: YELLOW comes out due to the stalled B-K Motorsports car.

Lap 31-34: Several cars come in under yellow to refuel and fresh tyres. Fuelrig problems at Tafel Racing for the #71 Porsche. Franchitti doesn�t stop due to miscommunication error.

Lap 36: Franchitti battling with Briscoe. They hit each other and Franchitti ends up in the wall. The car is stuck in the wall and YELLOW comes out again.

Lap 38: More pitstops as the race is under yellow. The #3 Corvette stalls and is towed to a safe area. Briscoe is handed a stop-go penalty for the Franchitti incident.

Lap 39: The #26 back in the pitlane but needs huge repairs, car put behind the wall.

Lap 42: McMurry puts the Autocon Lola into the tyrewall backwards, damaged rear wing. The lights on the safety car are back on again. B-K Motorsport Mazda officially retires from the race.

Lap 45: Green flag�Audi 1-2. Briscoe serves the stop-go.

Lap 48: Autocon Motorsport entry officially retired from the race while the AGR Acura is still being repaired behind the wall.

Lap 50: #1 Audi leads overall and LMP1, #15 Fernandez Racing leads LMP2. #4 Corvette GT1 and #62 Risi is leading the GT2 class. The #22 Panoz comes back into the pitlane, not a good day for that car.

Lap 57: The #3 Corvette is now officially retired from the race with a broken driveshaft. Mechanical failure on a factory Corvette, a unique moment! The #9 (Johansson) is hit from behind by Dyson in the #20 at the same place of the Briscoe/Franchitti incident. #9 spins but rejoins, #20 continues. Both car have winglets damaged.

Lap 58: #20 stalled sideways on track, nearly backtracks into a GT2 Porsche. Full course yellow for the third time this race as the Porsche is unable to get away.

Lap 65: Green flag. #31 goes off and nearly misses the Penske Porsche cars. All cars escape undamaged. The #26 has returned with Herta behind the wheel, they�ve lost nearly 30 laps.

Lap 72: #16 Dyson Porsche in the pitlane. Rear cover goes off, the car is able to return to the track though.

Lap 83: #2 Audi and #44 Lizard Porsche come in for a drive changes. Almost at the same moment #20 Dyson spins after being hit by Diaz in the #15 Fernandez Lola. #20 suffers a puncture as a result.

Lap 86: #15 comes in for driver change. Fernandez gets in but will have to come back in to serve a penalty for the contact with Dyson.

Lap 87: #15 comes in for the stop-go. Diaz disagrees with the penalty, saying Dyson blocked him to help his teammate.

Lap 89: Race leader, Audi #1, makes his pitstop.

Lap 91: GT2 leader Tomas Enge puts his #31 Ferrari in the wall with a big impact. For the second time in two races a Ferrari 430 GT catches fire after a crash. Full course yellow as medical intervention team comes out to check Enge.

Lap 97: The wreck of what was once a Ferrari 430 GT is taken off the track by a flatbed transporter. It is the fourth retirement from the race.

Lap 100: Still under yellow as the track is being cleaned after the heavy crash of the #31 Ferrari. Enge is taken to the medical centre for further examinations. #1 Audi leads the race, #6 leads LMP2 while #62 now leads GT2. #9 Johansson is handed a stop-go penalty after driving through the pitlane without stopping (the engine).

Lap 102: With 18 minutes to go in the race and a nice sunset we have gone green again! #16 comes into the pitlane, bad timing.

Lap 105: Chaos time at St. Pete! #21 Auberlen is touched from behind by Farnbacher in the #73. He spins but is going back on. The yellow flag comes out again quickly afterwards though as the #18 suffers a suspension failure and goes off in a spectacular style. At almost the same moment and same spot the #22 Panoz and #20 Porsche collide, sending Dyson into the tyre wall. Maxwell in the #22 returns to the pitlane, but the #20 is too damaged to continue.

Lap 108: #16 in the pitlane again with only a few minutes left. Not a particular good day for Dyson Racing.

Lap 110: Just over 3 minutes to go and the green flag is waved once again ending the fifth caution of the day. Tomas Enge is reported to be awake and alert.

Last lap: Audi #1 leads Audi #2, the gap is just three tenths of second. They keep fighting until the end. Audi wins an incident packed St. Petersburg race after just over 2 hours and 45 mins (114 laps) of racing, the margin between #1 and #2 at the finish is 0.426 seconds. The #37 completes the LMP1 podium .

The LMP2 victory goes to Penske. The #6 finishes 0.116 seconds ahead of its sistercar #7. The Highcroft #9 takes third.

In GT2 Risi Competizione #62 also wins the second race of the 2007 season, the #45 Lizards Porsche finishes second. Auberlen puts the #21 Panoz on the podium.

Beretta increases his number of ALMS wins by taking the GT1 class.

Planetlemans