Road America redux

Images from the Road America ALMS race by our crack photographer Dave R. Johnson.

Team Drayson seals the deal at Road America

ELKHART LAKE, Wi — Jonny Cocker recovered from a late race gafe and passed the Muscle Milk Porsche on the last straight away of the last lap to take the first win for Team Drayson. Cocker was the top qualifier, setting a new qualifying record for the track and reeled in three LMP cars that were ahead of him in the last four laps for the team’s first win of the series.

Team Drayson shown moments of brilliance over the last year, since it moved from the GT Vantage Aston Martin to the Lola Judd-powered LPM car, but it has never been to finish a race on the top rung, with either a shunt and or a mechanical issue getting in its way. Today in Wisconsin, it wiped out all of those nightmares with a brilliant piece of driver by Cocker over the last five laps of the race as he first picked off the Dyson Mazda, and then the defending series champion HPD Acura before passing the Porsche for the win.

More coverage and photos a little later.

It’s Drayson on the pole (again) in the heartland of American

ELKHART LAKE, Wi — It was Jonny Cocker in the Team Drayson Judd-powered Lola handily taking the team’s second straight pole at the 4.048 mile 14-turn course in the picturesque heartland of America, becoming the first driver this year to win two poles for his team and doing so by an amazing 1.321 seconds over the second place Lola Mazda team.

The challenge for Team Drayson now is to finish the race in the same position as they start — something that it has had extreme difficulty in pulling off during the 2010 season. This will put pressure on team owner Paul Drayson who will drive the first stint in the race Sunday and who had a shunt in a similar position at the last race at Mid Ohio two weeks ago.

Not surprising was the one-twp qualifying effort by the Corvette team in the course that features long straights and fast turns. The ZR1 Vette of  Olivier Gavin posted the top time in the qualifying session for the GT class. The top six GT cars were within one second of each other.

All Photos by Dave R. Johnson.

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