Grand-Am

SCC: Murry, Stanton win VIR 250

David Murry and Craig Stanton drove their pole sitting Porsche 996 to victory in the Grand-Am Cup Series VIR 250 at Virginia International Raceway. Stanton, who as five wins this season, is now a mere seven points behind Terry Borcheller in the ...

Edited: Dec 21, 2009, 5:26 AM

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David Murry and Craig Stanton drove their pole sitting Porsche 996 to victory in the Grand-Am Cup Series VIR 250 at Virginia International Raceway. Stanton, who as five wins this season, is now a mere seven points behind Terry Borcheller in the drivers' championship. Borcheller, who shared the No. 11 Powell Motorsports Cadillac CTS-V with Devon Powell, finished second, 7.478 seconds behind the winning Porsche.

"On the (second to last) restart, I was behind Terry and I just tried to be conservative with my brakes," said Murry, describing how he set up Borcheller for what turned out to be the race winning pass on Lap 56 of the 75-lap race. "I kept ducking out like was going to pass to make him use his (brakes) up and then when I saw him slide a little bit, I said, 'Now it's my turn.' So I got by him in Turn 1, but it wasn't easy. I went inside him and we sent side-by-side in the kin and he forced me out -- so I waited and I went underneath him again in Turn 3. Then I got away, but then the yellow came out.

"We couldn't put tires on because we were in the lead. If we had, we would have lost the lead. If I was Terry, I would have taken tires. But he didn't. And our pit stop was faster than theirs and that got me out, plus I had a little gap to begin with, so when I came down the front straight away I was hustling as much as I could. But there was a slow Neon coming out of the pits. I had already caught up to the pack so he was due to come out behind me and he did. And about that time Terry came up and he went around the Neon.

"But then Grand-Am saw what happened -- and I think rightly so -- put the Neon back between us because that's where he was when Terry came up. And that was a big difference in the end. On the restart, I was able to get a good start -- because you can't pass until the green flag comes out -- and I was on the gas when the pace car pulled in. And sure enough, that gave me enough of a gap that it made it tough for Terry. And then that's what gave us the opportunity to win at the end."

Of course, Borcheller, whose tires were beginning to lose grip late in the race thanks in part to the sheer heft of the Cadillac, saw things a little differently. "We just came up a little short at the end. I think the outcome of the race was because of the restart with the lapped car ahead of me, which is really a shame. He actually tried to help David and I both by pointing us by at the yellow. And for some reason he ended up going back by just me and not back by David.

"So David was able to get a 12- to 15-second jump on the restart and I was pushing hard to make that up, which I didn't know if I was going to be able to do or not. And I made a mistake, and that was that. It was a good race, though. Our team did a really good job with the stops and the yellows hit at the right times. If they keep taking stuff away from the Cadillac, it's going to make it hard to beat the Porsches. It's already very difficult, but they just seem to take something every race and I think enough is enough, really."

Dave Lacey and Greg Wilkins rounded out the top-three in the No. 17 Doncaster Racing Porsche.

In the ST class, Eric Curran and Bob Endicott won their first race of the year in the No. 27 Bill Fenton Motorsports Acura RSX-S. The No. 70 SpeedSource Mazda of Sylvain Tremblay and David Haskell finished second, followed by Tim Pappas and Beau Buisson in the No. 97 Turner Motorsport BMW 330i.

"It was a really good call on the pit stops," said Endicott. "We were the only ones that stopped on the first yellow, and it ended up working well for us. Eric kept us in there the beginning of the race. It was great for me -- all I had to do was drive it around."

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