The 2021 Northeast Grand Prix was a sports car race sanctioned by the International Motor Sports Association (IMSA). The race was held at Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut, on July 17, 2021. This race was the seventh round of the 2021 IMSA SportsCar Championship, and the fourth round of the 2021 WeatherTech Sprint Cup.

Initially scheduled to run for two hours and 40 minutes, severe weather in the area caused just under 90 minutes of the event to be completed. Antonio García and Jordan Taylor scored overall victory for Corvette Racing; their fourth class victory of the season.

Background

International Motor Sports Association's (IMSA) president John Doonan confirmed the race was part of the schedule for the 2021 IMSA SportsCar Championship (IMSA SCC) in September 2020. It was the sixth year it was part of the IMSA SCC. The 2021 Northeast Grand Prix was the seventh of twelve sports car races of 2021 by IMSA, and it was the fourth round held as part of the WeatherTech Sprint Cup. The race was held at the seven-turn Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut, on July 17, 2021.

The race marked IMSA's return to Lime Rock Park following the 2020 edition's cancellation due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As in previous years, the event was also the first GT-only round of the IMSA SportsCar Championship season, in which only the GTLM and GTD classes were scheduled to compete.

On July 8, 2021, IMSA released the latest technical bulletin outlining Balance of Performance for the event. In GTLM, after a 1-2 finish at the WeatherTech 240, the Corvette received a 10 kilogram weight increase. The Porsche, meanwhile, received a 20 kilogram weight break. No changes were made in GTD.

Before the race, Antonio García and Jordan Taylor led the GTLM Drivers' Championship with 1082 points, 81 points ahead of Tommy Milner and Nick Tandy followed by Cooper MacNeil in third. With 1296 points, the GTD Drivers' Championship was led by Bill Auberlen and Robby Foley, ahead of Roman De Angelis and Ross Gunn. Chevrolet and BMW were leading their respective Manufacturers' Championships, while Corvette Racing and Turner Motorsport each led their own Teams' Championships.

Entries

A total of 16 cars took part in the event, split across two classes. 3 cars were entered in GTLM, and 13 in GTD. 17 cars were featured on the pre-event entry list, and the final tally of 16 was reached following Alegra Motorsports' withdrawal due to sponsorship issues.

GTLM saw an identical entry list from the previous round at Watkins Glen, comprising the pair of Corvette Racing entries and the lone Porsche from WeatherTech Racing. In GTD, Gilbert Korthoff Motorsports didn't return after completing their planned single outing at Watkins Glen, while Pfaff Motorsports, Wright Motorsports, and Magnus Racing returned after skipping the most recent round, which only paid points towards the WeatherTech Sprint Cup.

Practice There were two practice sessions preceding the start of the race on Saturday, both on Friday. The first session lasted one hour on Friday morning while the second session lasted 75 minutes on Friday afternoon.

Practice 1 The first practice session took place at 11:45 am ET and ended with Antonio García topping the charts for Corvette Racing, with a lap time of 50.456. Nick Tandy's No. 4 Corvette was second fastest followed by Mathieu Jaminet in the No. 79 Porsche. The GTD class was topped by the No. 19 GRT Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo of Franck Perera with a time of 52.499, ahead of Patrick Long in the No. 16 Porsche. ClassTeamDriverTime1GTLM3Corvette RacingAntonio García50.456_2GTLM4Corvette RacingNick Tandy50.493 +0.0373GTLM79WeatherTech RacingMathieu Jaminet50.796 +0.340Sources:

Practice 2 The second and final practice session took place at 1:55 pm ET on Friday and ended with Tommy Milner topping the charts for Corvette Racing, with a lap time of 50.961, 0.329 seconds faster than Jordan Taylor's No. 3 Corvette. The GTD class was topped by the No. 9 Pfaff Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R of Zacharie Robichon with a time of 52.380. Aaron Telitz's No. 14 Lexus was second fastest followed by Trent Hindman in the Wright Motorsports entry. The session was red flagged for 15 minutes to due severe weather. ClassTeamDriverTime1GTLM4Corvette RacingTommy Milner50.961_2GTLM3Corvette RacingJordan Taylor51.290 +0.3293GTD9Pfaff MotorsportsZacharie Robichon52.380 +1.419Sources:

Qualifying

Qualifying was broken into two sessions. The first was for cars in the GTD class. Roman De Angelis qualified on pole for the class driving the No. 23 car for Heart of Racing Team, beating Aaron Telitz in the No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing entry by 0.045 seconds. Richard Heistand was third in the No. 39 Audi followed by Frankie Montecalvo in the No. 12 Lexus.

The final session of qualifying was for the GTLM and GTD classes. Jordan Taylor qualified on pole in GTLM driving the No. 3 car for Corvette Racing, beating teammate Tommy Milner in the sister No. 4 Corvette Racing entry by less than 0.150 seconds. Jack Hawksworth set the fastest time in the GTD points paying session and earned 35 championship points. The session saw one incident when Cooper MacNeil, driving the No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Porsche, spun at turn 3 and got stuck on the grass. For causing a red flag, MacNeil had his best two laps from the session deleted.

Qualifying results Pole positions in each class are indicated in bold and by . ClassTeamDriverTime1GTLM3 Corvette Racing Jordan Taylor49.958_12 GTLM 4 Corvette Racing Tommy Milner 50.100 +0.142 33 GTLM 79 WeatherTech Racing Cooper MacNeil 50.833 +0.875 24GTD23 Heart Of Racing Team Roman De Angelis51.729 +1.77145 GTD 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing Aaron Telitz 51.774 +1.816 56 GTD 39 CarBahn Motorsports with Peregrine Racing Richard Heistand 51.784 +1.826 67 GTD 12 Vasser Sullivan Racing Frankie Montecalvo 51.937 +1.979 78 GTD 1 Paul Miller Racing Madison Snow 51.989 +2.031 89 GTD 9 Pfaff Motorsports Zacharie Robichon 52.023 +2.065 910 GTD 96 Turner Motorsport Robby Foley 52.053 +2.095 1011 GTD 16 Wright Motorsports John Potter 52.142 +2.184 1112 GTD 66 Gradient Racing Till Bechtolsheimer 52.271 +2.313 1213 GTD 76 Compass Racing Jeff Kingsley 52.278 +2.320 1314 GTD 19 GRT Grasser Racing Team Misha Goikhberg 52.400 +2.442 1415 GTD 88 Team Hardpoint EBM Rob Ferriol 53.333 +3.375 1516 GTD 44 Magnus Racing with Archangel Motorsports John Potter 53.396 +3.438 16Sources:

The No. 4 Corvette Racing entry was moved to the back of the GTLM field as per Article 40.5 of the Sporting regulations (Engine change).

Race

Post-race With a total of 1852 points, García and Taylor's victory allowed them to increase their advantage over Milner and Tandy in the GTLM Drivers' Championship. Jaminet advanced from eighth to fifth. As a result of winning the race, De Angelis and Gunn took the lead of the GTD Drivers' Championship. Chevrolet continued to took the GTLM Manufactures' Championship while Aston Martin took the lead of the GTD Manufactures' Championship. Corvette Racing kept their advantage in GTLM Teams' Championship while Heart of Racing Team took the lead of the GTD Teams' Championship with five rounds remaining in the season.

Race results Class winners are denoted in bold and .

Pos Class Team Drivers Chassis Laps Time/Retired Engine 1 GTLM 3 Corvette Racing Antonio García Jordan Taylor Chevrolet Corvette C8.R 100 1:28:29.019 Chevrolet 5.5L V8 2 GTLM 4 Corvette Racing Tommy Milner Nick Tandy Chevrolet Corvette C8.R 100 +18.134 Chevrolet 5.5L V8 3 GTLM 79 WeatherTech Racing Cooper MacNeil Mathieu Jaminet Porsche 911 RSR-19 100 +27.793 Porsche 4.2L Flat-6 4 GTD 23 Heart of Racing Team Roman De Angelis Ross Gunn Aston Martin Vantage GT3 98 +2 Laps Mercedes-Benz M177 4.0 L Turbo V8 5 GTD 1 Paul Miller Racing Bryan Sellers Madison Snow Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 98 +2 Laps Lamborghini 5.2L V10 6 GTD 14 Vasser Sullivan Racing Aaron Telitz Jack Hawksworth Lexus RC F GT3 98 +2 Laps Lexus 5.0L V8 7 GTD 9 Pfaff Motorsports Zacharie Robichon Laurens Vanthoor Porsche 911 GT3 R 98 +2 Laps Porsche 4.0L Flat-6 8 GTD 96 Turner Motorsport Bill Auberlen Robby Foley BMW M6 GT3 98 +2 Laps BMW 4.4L Turbo V8 9 GTD 39 CarBahn Motorsports with Peregrine Racing Richard Heistand Jeff Westphal Audi R8 LMS Evo 97 +3 Laps Audi 5.2L V10 10 GTD 19 GRT Grasser Racing Team Misha Goikhberg Franck Perera Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo 97 +3 Laps Lamborghini 5.2L V10 11 GTD 16 Wright Motorsports Trent Hindman Patrick Long Porsche 911 GT3 R 97 +3 Laps Porsche 4.0L Flat-6 12 GTD 76 Compass Racing Jeff Kingsley Mario Farnbacher Acura NSX GT3 Evo 97 +3 Laps Acura 3.5L Turbo V6 13 GTD 12 Vasser Sullivan Racing Frankie Montecalvo Zach Veach Lexus RC F GT3 97 +3 Laps Lexus 5.0L V8 14 GTD 66 Gradient Racing Till Bechtolsheimer Marc Miller Acura NSX GT3 Evo 97 +3 Laps Acura 3.5L Turbo V6 15 GTD 88 Team Hardpoint EBM Rob Ferriol Katherine Legge Porsche 911 GT3 R 96 +4 Laps Porsche 4.0L Flat-6 16 GTD 44 Magnus Racing with Archangel Motorsports John Potter Andy LallyAcura NSX GT3 Evo 95 +5 LapsAcura 3.5L Turbo V6Sources:

Standings after the race

+DPi Drivers' Championship standings +/– Driver Points 1 Filipe Albuquerque Ricky Taylor 2068 2 Oliver Jarvis Harry Tincknell 1987 3 Pipo Derani Felipe Nasr 1954 4 Kevin Magnussen Renger van der Zande 1849 5 Dane Cameron Olivier Pla 1793

+LMP2 Drivers' Championship standings +/– Driver Points 1 Mikkel Jensen Ben Keating 1087 2 Tristan Nunez Steven Thomas 1052 3 Gabriel Aubry John Farano 964 4 Scott Huffaker 702 5 Thomas Merrill 700

+LMP3 Drivers' Championship standings +/– Driver Points 1 Gar Robinson 1468 2 Jon Bennett Colin Braun 1372 3 Jim Cox Dylan Murry 1290 4 Oliver Askew 1214 5 Rasmus Lindh Dan Goldburg 1183

+GTLM Drivers' Championship standings +/– Driver Points 1 Antonio García Jordan Taylor 1852 2 Tommy Milner Nick Tandy 1661 3 Cooper MacNeil 1604 4 John Edwards Augusto Farfus Jesse Krohn 1001 5 3 Mathieu Jaminet 994

+GTD Drivers' Championship standings +/– Driver Points 1 1 Roman De Angelis Ross Gunn 1606 2 1 Bill Auberlen Robby Foley 1578 3 Madison Snow Bryan Sellers 1536 4 Zacharie Robichon Laurens Vanthoor 1445 5 Patrick Long 1389

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

+DPi Teams' Championship standings +/– Team Points 1 #10 WTR-Konica Minolta Acura 2068 2 #55 Mazda Motorsports 1987 3 #31 Whelen Engineering Racing 1954 4 #01 Cadillac Chip Ganassi Racing 1849 5 #60 Meyer Shank Racing w/ Curb-Agajanian 1793

+LMP2 Teams' Championship standings +/– Team Points 1 #52 PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports 1087 2 #11 WIN Autosport 1052 3 #8 Tower Motorsport 964 4 #18 Era Motorsport 640 5 #22 United Autosports 614

+LMP3 Teams' Championship standings +/– Team Points 1 #74 Riley Motorsports 1468 2 #54 CORE Autosport 1372 3 #91 Riley Motorsports 1290 4 #38 Performance Tech Motorsports 1183 5 #36 Andretti Autosport 902

+GTLM Teams' Championship standings +/– Team Points 1 #3 Corvette Racing 1852 2 #4 Corvette Racing 1661 3 #79 WeatherTech Racing 1604 4 #24 BMW Team RLL 1001 5 #25 BMW Team RLL 966

+GTD Teams' Championship standings +/– Team Points 1 1 #23 Heart of Racing Team 1606 2 1 #96 Turner Motorsport 1578 3 #1 Paul Miller Racing 1536 4 #9 Pfaff Motorsports 1445 5 #16 Wright Motorsports 1389

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

+DPi Manufacturers' Championship standings +/– Manufacturer Points 1 Cadillac 2189 2 Acura 2154 3 Mazda 2059

+GTLM Manufacturers' Championship standings +/– Manufacturer Points 1 Chevrolet 1875 2 Porsche 1726 3 BMW 1052 4 Ferrari 330

+GTD Manufacturers' Championship standings +/– Manufacturer Points 1 2 Aston Martin 1656 2 Lamborghini 1633 3 2 BMW 1627 4 Porsche 1579 5 Lexus 1545

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

References

External links