Samanta Tan and Team STR on top of the Pro-Am class at COTA

Team Samantha Tan Racing secures the Fanatec GT World Challenge Pro-Am victory at the Circuit of the Americas.

The twists and turns and bumps at the Circuit of the Americas always make for an interesting race. This year’s round of the GT World Challenge was no exception. High track temperatures provided additional challenges for Drivers and pit lane crews.

In Race 1, Alec Udell and Tommy Milner took the Pro class and overall win for DXDT Racing, while Samantha Tan and Neil Verhagen finished second in the overall running and won the Pro-Am class for ST Racing.

At the start of the race, the fight for the Pro lead was between Auberlen’s No.28 ST Racing BMW and Udell’s No.63 DXDT Racing Corvette. The No.28 took the lead after the green flag, and the Corvette got it back 15 minutes later. The other ST Racing BMW, Samantha Tan’s No.38 Pro-Am car, quickly got into second, and the two cars kept the lead throughout race 1.

Udell’s teammate, Tommy Milner, started his stint in the class lead and extended the gap for the overall lead of the race.

The No.63 earned the class win, followed by Wright Motorsports in second and ST Racing in third.
In the Pro-Am class, Tan and Verhagen crossed the line first in the No.38 ST Racing BMW, followed by RS1 and CrowdStrike.

The next day, for Race 2, there was a first-place repeat in both classes: Tommy Milner and Alec Udell repeated the win in the Pro class, and Samantha Tan and Neil Verhagen also clinched a double podium in Pro-Am.

In GT America, Race 1 saw Daskalos and the No.27 CRP racing on top of the podium for the SRO3 class, while Sherman took the win in GT4 aboard the No.98 Rotek Racing Porsche.

Full course yellow flags during Race 2 added even more drama to what is already a challenging and technical track.

George Kurtz of Team CrowdStrike by Riley won the overall with the No.4 Mercedes and also won the SRO3 class. In the GT4 class, the fastest was Swearingin in the No.7 ACI Motorsports Team Porsche 718 Cayman, ahead of Sherman and Newell.

Once again, the Circuit of the Americas delivered exciting and challenging races, and soon, it will be time for the COTA fans to welcome back the World Endurance Championship at the end of August.