The 2017 Mobil 1 SportsCar Grand Prix was a sports car race sanctioned by the International Motor Sports Association (IMSA). The race was held at Canadian Tire Motorsports Park in Bowmanville, Ontario, Canada on July 9, 2017. The race was the seventh round of the 2017 IMSA SportsCar Championship.

Background

IMSA's president Scott Atherton confirmed the Mobil 1 SportsCar Grand Prix was part of the series' schedule for the 2017 IMSA SportsCar Championship at Road America's victory lane in August 2016. ^[1] It was the fourth consecutive year the event was held as part of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship and the thirty-sixth annual running of the race. The 2017 Mobil 1 SportsCar Grand Prix was the seventh of twelve scheduled sports car races of 2017 by IMSA, and was the fourth round not held on the held as part of the North American Endurance Cup. ^[2] The race was held at the ten-turn 2.459 mi (3.957 km) Canadian Tire Motorsports Park in Bowmanville, Ontario, Canada on July 9, 2017. ^[2] After the Sahlen's Six Hours of the Glen one week earlier, Jordan Taylor and Ricky Taylor led the Prototype Drivers' Championship with 202 points, ahead of João Barbosa and Christian Fittipaldi with 182 points, and Misha Goikhberg and Stephen Simpson with 167 points. ^[3] With 180 points, the PC Drivers' Championship was led by James French and Patricio O'Ward with a thirty-point advantage over Don Yount. ^[3] Antonio García and Jan Magnussen led the GTLM Drivers' Championship with 154 points, ahead of Joey Hand and Dirk Müller with 146 points. ^[3] In GTD, the Drivers' Championship was led by Alessandro Balzan and Christina Nielsen with 173 points, ahead of Ben Keating and Jeroen Bleekemolen with 171 points. Cadillac, Chevrolet, and Mercedes-AMG were leading their respective Manufacturers' Championships, while Wayne Taylor Racing, Performance Tech Motorsports, Corvette Racing, and Scuderia Corsa each led their own Teams' Championships. ^[3]

Entries

A total of 36 cars took part in the event split across 4 classes. 10 cars were entered in P, 3 in PC, 8 in GTLM, and 15 in GTD. ^[4] In P, David Ostella and Nicholas Boulle replaced José Gutiérrez and Olivier Pla in the PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports entry. ^[5] Pipo Derani joined Johannes van Overbeek in the #22 Tequila Patrón ESM. In PC, Ryan Lewis joined Don Yount in the #20 BAR1 Motorsports entry. Garett Grist and James Vance shared the #26 BAR1 Motorsports entry. ^[6] In GTD, Alex Job Racing and Dream Racing Motorsport skipped the event. Jörg Bergmeister returned to the Park Place Motorsports entry after missing the previous round at Watkins Glen due to a family emergency. ^[6] Bret Curtis returned to the Turner Motorsport entry.

Practice

There were three practice sessions preceding the start of the race on Saturday, two on Friday and one on Saturday. The first two one-hour sessions were on Friday morning and afternoon. The third on Saturday morning lasted an hour. ^[7]

Practice 1

The first practice session took place at 11:20 am ET on Friday and ended with Jordan Taylor topping the charts for Wayne Taylor Racing, with a lap time of 1:09.443. ^[8] The PC class was topped by the #38 Performance Tech Motorsports Oreca FLM09 of Patricio O'Ward with a time of 1:12.512. ^[9] Laurens Vanthoor was fastest in GTLM while Andy Lally set the fastest time in GTD. ^[9]

Pos.	Class	No.	Team	Driver	Time	Gap
1	P	10	Wayne Taylor Racing	Jordan Taylor	1:09.443	_
2	P	2	Tequila Patrón ESM	Ryan Dalziel	1:09.450	+0.007
3	P	55	Mazda Motorsports	Jonathan Bomarito	1:09.741	+0.298
Sources: [10] [11]

Practice 2

The second practice session took place at 3:55 pm ET on Friday and ended with Ryan Dalziel topping the charts for Tequila Patrón ESM, with a lap time of 1:08.994. ^[12] James French set the fastest time in PC. The GTLM class was topped by the #912 Porsche GT Team Porsche 911 RSR of Laurens Vanthoor with a time of 1:14.753. Patrick Pilet was second in the sister #911 car and John Edwards rounded out the top 3. ^[13] Sage Karam was fastest in GTD. ^[13]

Pos.	Class	No.	Team	Driver	Time	Gap
1	P	2	Tequila Patrón ESM	Ryan Dalziel	1:08.994	_
2	P	10	Wayne Taylor Racing	Ricky Taylor	1:09.053	+0.059
3	P	22	Tequila Patrón ESM	Pipo Derani	1:09.093	+0.099
Sources: [14] [15]

Practice 3

The third and final practice session took place at 9:20 am ET on Saturday and ended with Stephen Simpson topping the charts for JDC-Miller MotorSports, with a lap time of 1:09.142. ^[16] Patricio O'Ward set the fastest time PC by 1.678 seconds ahead of Ryan Lewis in the #20 BAR1 Motorsports entry. ^[16] The GTLM class was topped by the #911 Porsche GT Team Porsche 911 RSR of Dirk Werner with a time of 1:14.799. ^[17] Tristan Vautier was fastest in GTD. ^[17] The session was red flagged two times. 20 minutes into the session, the #15 3GT Racing Lexus RC F GT3 of Jack Hawksworth crashed at turn 3 after going wide, and dipped into the grass launching the car into the tire barriers before becoming airborne. The car suffered heavy damage to the front, but Hawksworth was uninjured and exited his car without external aid. ^[18] The final stoppage came for debris on the track. ^[16]

Pos.	Class	No.	Team	Driver	Time	Gap
1	P	85	JDC-Miller MotorSports	Stephen Simpson	1:09.142	_
2	P	10	Wayne Taylor Racing	Jordan Taylor	1:09.195	+0.053
3	P	22	Tequila Patrón ESM	Pipo Derani	1:09.374	+0.232
Sources: [19] [20]

Qualifying

In Saturday afternoon's 90-minute four-group qualifying, each category had separate 15-minute sessions. Regulations stipulated that teams nominate one qualifying driver, with the fastest laps determining each class' starting order. IMSA arranged the grid to put Prototypes ahead of the PC, GTLM and GTD cars. ^{[21] [7]}

The first was for cars in GTD class. Sage Karam qualified on pole for the class driving the #14 3GT Racing entry, besting Andrew Davis in the #57 Stevenson Motorsports entry. ^[22]

The second session of qualifying was for cars in the GTLM class. Dirk Werner qualified on pole driving the #911 car for Porsche GT Team, beating Bill Auberlen in the #25 BMW Team RLL entry by less than one tenth of a second. ^[23]

The third session of qualifying was for cars in the PC class. James French set the fastest time driving the #38 Performance Tech Motorsports entry. ^[24]

The final session of qualifying was for the P class. Ricky Taylor qualified on pole driving the #10 car for Wayne Taylor Racing, besting Mikhail Goikhberg in the #85 entry from JDC-Miller MotorSports. ^{[24] [22]}

Qualifying results

Pole positions in each class are indicated in bold and by ‡.

Pos.	Class	No.	Team	Driver	Time	Gap	Grid
1	P	10	Wayne Taylor Racing	Ricky Taylor	1:08.459	_	1‡
2	P	85	JDC-Miller MotorSports	Mikhail Goikhberg	1:08.587	+0.128	2
3	P	2	Tequila Patrón ESM	Scott Sharp	1:08.886	+0.427	3
4	P	22	Tequila Patrón ESM	Johannes van Overbeek	1:08.934	+0.475	4
5	P	55	Mazda Motorsports	Jonathan Bomarito	1:08.959	+0.500	5
6	P	5	Mustang Sampling Racing	Christian Fittipaldi	1:09.173	+0.714	6
7	P	90	VisitFlorida Racing	Marc Goossens	1:09.286	+0.827	7
8	P	31	Whelen Engineering Racing	Eric Curran	1:09.895	+1.436	8
9	P	52	PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports	Nicholas Boulle	1:09.958	+1.499	9
10	P	70	Mazda Motorsports	Tom Long	1:09.959	+1.500	10
11	PC	38	Performance Tech Motorsports	James French	1:11.471	+3.012	11‡
12	PC	26	BAR1 Motorsports	Garett Grist	1:13.193	+4.734	12
13	PC	20	BAR1 Motorsports	Don Yount	1:13.821	+5.362	13
14	GTLM	911	Porsche GT Team	Dirk Werner	1:14.085	+5.626	14‡
15	GTLM	25	BMW Team RLL	Bill Auberlen	1:14.103	+5.644	15
16	GTLM	912	Porsche GT Team	Laurens Vanthoor	1:14.251	+5.792	16
17	GTLM	24	BMW Team RLL	Martin Tomczyk	1:14.294	+5.835	17
18	GTLM	67	Ford Chip Ganassi Racing	Ryan Briscoe	1:14.434	+5.975	18
19	GTLM	66	Ford Chip Ganassi Racing	Joey Hand	1:14.732	+6.273	19
20	GTLM	3	Corvette Racing	Jan Magnussen	1:14.844	+6.385	20
21	GTLM	4	Corvette Racing	Oliver Gavin	1:14.904	+6.445	21
22	GTD	14	3GT Racing	Sage Karam	1:16.563	+8.104	22‡
23	GTD	57	Stevenson Motorsports	Andrew Davis	1:16.828	+8.266	23
24	GTD	86	Michael Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian	Jeff Segal	1:17.106	+8.369	24
25	GTD	48	Paul Miller Racing	Bryan Sellers	1:17.149	+8.647	25
26	GTD	63	Scuderia Corsa	Christina Nielsen	1:17.149	+8.690	26
27	GTD	93	Michael Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian	Katherine Legge	1:17.265	+8.806	27
28	GTD	16	Change Racing	Corey Lewis	1:17.281	+8.822	28
29	GTD	96	Turner Motorsport	Bret Curtis	1:17.524	+9.065	29
30	GTD	73	Park Place Motorsports	Patrick Lindsey	1:17.672	+9.213	30
31	GTD	75	SunEnergy1 Racing	Kenny Habul	1:17.817	+9.358	31
32	GTD	50	Riley Motorsports – WeatherTech Racing	Cooper MacNeil	1:17.959	+9.500	32
33	GTD	33	Riley Motorsports – Team AMG	Ben Keating	1:18.073	+9.614	33
34	GTD	28	Alegra Motorsports	Michael de Quesada	1:18.085	+9.626	34
35	GTD	54	CORE Autosport	Jon Bennett	1:19.220	+10.761	36 1
36	GTD	15	3GT Racing	Did Not Participate			35 2
Sources: [25] [26]

• ¹ The No. 54 CORE Autosport entry was moved to the back of the GTD field entry was moved to the back of the GTD field as per Article 43.6 of the Sporting regulations (Change of starting tires). ^[21]
• ² The No. 15 3GT Racing entry was moved to the back of the GTD field as per Article 43.5 of the Sporting regulations (Change of starting driver). ^[21]

Race

Post-race

The result kept Jordan Taylor and Ricky Taylor atop the Prototype Drivers' Championship with 226 points, 19 points ahead of fifth-place finishers Barbosa and Fittipaldi. ^[27] In the PC Drivers' Championship, French and O'Ward extended their points lead to thirty-two points over Yount. ^[27] In the GTLM Drivers' Championship, Auberlen and Sims advanced from third to second. ^[27] The result kept Balzan and Nielsen atop the GTD Drivers' Championship while Aschenbach and Davis advanced from seventh to fifth. ^[27] Cadillac, and Chevrolet continued to top their respective Manufacturers' Championships. Ferrari took the lead of the GTD Manufacturers' Championship while Wayne Taylor Racing, Performance Tech Motorsports, Corvette Racing, and Scuderia Corsa kept their respective advantages in the Teams' Championships with five rounds left in the season. ^[27]

Results

Class winners are denoted in bold and ‡.

Final race classification Pos Class No. Team Drivers Chassis Tire Laps Time/Retired Engine 1 P 31 Whelen Engineering Racing Dane Cameron Eric Curran Cadillac DPi-V.R C 122 2:41:14.508‡ Cadillac 6.2 L V8 2 P 85 JDC-Miller MotorSports Mikhail Goikhberg Stephen Simpson Oreca 07 C 122 +8.295 Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8 3 P 2 Tequila Patrón ESM Scott Sharp Ryan Dalziel Nissan Onroak DPi C 122 +12.420 Nissan VR38DETT 3.8 L Turbo V6 4 P 55 Mazda Motorsports Tristan Nunez Jonathan Bomarito Mazda RT24-P C 122 +13.234 Mazda MZ-2.0T 2.0 L Turbo I4 5 P 70 Mazda Motorsports Tom Long Joel Miller Mazda RT24-P C 122 +14.716 Mazda MZ-2.0T 2.0 L Turbo I4 6 P 5 Mustang Sampling Racing João Barbosa Christian Fittipaldi Cadillac DPi-V.R C 122 +21.083 Cadillac 6.2 L V8 7 P 10 Wayne Taylor Racing Ricky Taylor Jordan Taylor Cadillac DPi-V.R C 120 +2 Laps Cadillac 6.2 L V8 8 PC 38 Performance Tech Motorsports James French Patricio O'Ward Oreca FLM09 C 117 +5 Laps‡ Chevrolet 6.2 L V8 9 GTLM 25 BMW Team RLL Bill Auberlen Alexander Sims BMW M6 GTLM M 117 +5 Laps‡ BMW 4.4 L Turbo V8 10 GTLM 24 BMW Team RLL John Edwards Martin Tomczyk BMW M6 GTLM M 117 +5 Laps BMW 4.4 L Turbo V8 11 GTLM 67 Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Ryan Briscoe Richard Westbrook Ford GT M 117 +5 Laps Ford EcoBoost 3.5 L Twin-turbo V6 12 GTLM 3 Corvette Racing Jan Magnussen Antonio García Chevrolet Corvette C7.R M 117 +5 Laps Chevrolet LT5.5 5.5 L V8 13 GTLM 66 Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Dirk Müller Joey Hand Ford GT M 117 +5 Laps Ford EcoBoost 3.5 L Twin-turbo V6 14 GTLM 912 Porsche GT Team Gianmaria Bruni Laurens Vanthoor Porsche 911 RSR M 117 +5 Laps Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6 15 P 52 PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports Nicholas Boulle David Ostella Ligier JS P217 C 116 Crash Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8 16 PC 20 BAR1 Motorsports Don Yount Ryan Lewis Oreca FLM09 C 116 +6 Laps Chevrolet 6.2 L V8 17 GTD 57 Stevenson Motorsports Andrew Davis Lawson Aschenbach Audi R8 LMS C 114 +8 Laps‡ Audi 5.2L V10 18 GTD 93 Michael Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Andy Lally Katherine Legge Acura NSX GT3 C 114 +8 Laps Acura 3.5 L Turbo V6 19 GTD 63 Scuderia Corsa Christina Nielsen Alessandro Balzan Ferrari 488 GT3 C 114 +8 Laps Ferrari F154CB 3.9 L Turbo V8 20 GTD 96 Turner Motorsport Jens Klingmann Bret Curtis BMW M6 GT3 C 114 +8 Laps BMW 4.4L Turbo V8 21 GTD 14 3GT Racing Scott Pruett Sage Karam Lexus RC F GT3 C 114 +8 Laps Lexus 5.0L V8 22 GTD 16 Change Racing Corey Lewis Jeroen Mul Lamborghini Huracán GT3 C 114 +8 Laps Lamborghini 5.2 L V10 23 GTD 33 Riley Motorsports – Team AMG Jeroen Bleekemolen Ben Keating Mercedes-AMG GT3 C 114 +8 Laps Mercedes AMG M159 6.2 L V8 24 GTD 48 Paul Miller Racing Bryan Sellers Madison Snow Lamborghini Huracán GT3 C 113 +9 Laps Lamborghini 5.2 L V10 25 GTD 73 Park Place Motorsports Jörg Bergmeister Patrick Lindsey Porsche 911 GT3 R C 113 +9 Laps Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6 26 GTD 86 Michael Shank Racing with Curb Agajanian Jeff Segal Oswaldo Negri Jr. Acura NSX GT3 C 113 +9 Laps Acura 3.5 L Turbo V6 27 GTD 50 Riley Motorsports – WeatherTech Racing Cooper MacNeil Gunnar Jeannette Mercedes-AMG GT3 C 113 +9 Laps Mercedes AMG M159 6.2 L V8 28 PC 26 BAR1 Motorsports Garett Grist James Vance Oreca FLM09 C 113 +9 Laps Chevrolet 6.2 L V8 29 GTD 15 3GT Racing Robert Alon Jack Hawksworth Lexus RC F GT3 C 63 +10 Laps Lexus 5.0L V8 30 GTD 75 SunEnergy1 Racing Tristan Vautier Kenny Habul Mercedes-AMG GT3 C 112 +10 Laps Mercedes AMG M159 6.2 L V8 31 GTD 54 CORE Autosport Jon Bennett Colin Braun Porsche 911 GT3 R C 112 +10 Laps Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6 32 GTD 28 Alegra Motorsports Michael de Quesada Daniel Morad Porsche 911 GT3 R C 112 +10 Laps Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6 33 GTLM 911 Porsche GT Team Patrick Pilet Dirk Werner Porsche 911 RSR M 109 +13 Laps Porsche 4.0 L Flat-6 34 DNF GTLM 4 Corvette Racing Oliver Gavin Tommy Milner Chevrolet Corvette C7.R M 102 Crash Chevrolet LT5.5 5.5 L V8 35 DNF P 22 Tequila Patrón ESM Johannes van Overbeek Pipo Derani Nissan Onroak DPi C 89 Fire Nissan VR38DETT 3.8 L Turbo V6 36 DNF P 90 VisitFlorida Racing Marc Goossens Renger van der Zande Riley Mk. 30 C 35 Electrical Gibson GK428 4.2 L V8 Sources: [28] [29]

Tyre manufacturers Key Symbol Tyre manufacturer C Continental M Michelin

Standings after the race

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

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

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

References

IMSA SportsCar Championship
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