- First-lap contact chance for Peter Kox to contend
- Acura NSX GT3 cars both finish on lead lap in tight Long Beach race
- Ryan Eversley leads team with 11th-place result
Sunday’s Pirelli World Challenge event in Long Beach started with a bang for the RealTime Racing Acura NSX GT3 cars, which seemed fitting for a race that featured a mid-race delay for water that had nothing to do with rain.
Peter Kox suffered damage from a multi-car incident on the race’s first lap, negating a strong start and forcing the Dutchman to fight for a 13th-place finish. Ryan Eversley made an aggressive move to start the race and was able to make up a pair of positions, eventually finishing 11th after starting 13th.
“It is very disappointing to have a day like this where you get hit so early in the race,” said NSX GT3 Project Leader Lee Niffenegger. “It is so hard to pass here and when you get hit and get dropped back in the order, it really makes it hard to gain any ground back. But we did do some good things, had some good laps and we will get back to work this week in testing.”
Kox immediately gained two positions from his 10th-place starting spot, just before getting hit on both ends. The contact broke the front grille of the Acura NSX GT3 and dropped it back to 17th, where Kox got to work on bringing it back through the field.
“It was a crazy start,” Kox recalled. “You are here for three days and you hope something like this doesn’t happen to you, but we got hit on the first lap. It’s a shame because we had reasonably good pace but we didn’t get a chance to show it.”
Eversley was in 12th leading a four-car group, which also included his teammate, when he noticed water on the course – a strange sight since the morning clouds had already cleared and no rain was forecast. Seconds later the race was red-flagged as water streamed across the track.
“I saw it and I called in to my guys and you could tell there was going to be some kind of problem,” said Eversley. “Pretty soon it was like a river coming across the circuit.”
An accident on the public roads surrounding the circuit led to a broken fire hydrant that caused a 25-minute delay. Eversley resumed the lead of the four-car group once the green flag waved and was able to hold his spot to the checkered flag. Kox passed Michael Cooper’s Cadillac to gain a late position and each car claimed another spot with Johnny O’Connell’s late-race crash.
“I got a really good run out of the hairpin leading to the start and I went for a gap,” Eversley continued. “But next thing I knew, Peter got hit, and had gotten bumped into me and we were bouncing into each other, which is usually not good.”
Making the most of their West Coast trip, the RealTime Racing Acura NSX GT3 team will visit Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca for testing before heading to the road course at Virginia International Raceway April 28-30 for the fourth and fifth rounds of the 2017 Pirelli World Challenge calendar.
The Acura NSX GT3 racecar utilizes the production NSX’s lightweight multi-material body with aluminum-intensive space frame, and is powered by a 3.5-liter, 75-degree, twin-turbocharged DOHC V-6 engine. The engine uses the same design specifications as the production 2017 Acura NSX, including the block, heads, valve train, crankshaft, pistons and dry-sump lubrication system. The engine is paired with a 6-speed, sequential-shift racing gearbox, delivering power to the rear wheels. The Acura NSX is produced at the Performance Manufacturing Center in Ohio.
Video recaps from this weekend’s Acura Pirelli World Challenge racing activities at Long Beach are being posted on the “Honda Racing/HPD” YouTube channel. Produced by the Carolinas Production Group, the video packages can be found in the 2017 HPD Trackside Video Playlist at: https://www.youtube.com/HondaRacingHPDTV.
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