2014 TUDOR United SportsCar Championship

Leemstradamus · May 1, 2014

Bernd Graf said:
Wow, that is hardly anything when you think about the 1200 kilo 950BHP LaFerrari whose preliminary tests were released this week

Would be interesting to see some lap times from it in the future.

johnnymat · May 6, 2014

I enjoyed the 2 races at Laguna yesterday. Both races were very entertaining. In fact, I prefer the 2 hour sprint format they used.
IMSA has done what they said and restrained from having so many full-course cautions. I can think of 3 or 4 incidents that would have been safety car periods before. Kudos to IMSA for listening to the fans.
The fact that they had 53 cars entered is also good.
Finally, It was nice to see a P2 car get the win.

Nelson Ullinskey · May 6, 2014

I was very impressed with last Sunday. I did not catch the first race as I was watching Nazzzcar car instead, but the second race was awesome! None of those stupid full course yellows, P2s and DPs seemed to be balanced really well now. Looking like it will be a great season! Only complaint is that in recent years this race was 4 or 6 hours. But still, it was entertaining and I understand why they did only 2 2 hours races.

Bernd Graf · May 6, 2014

Nelson Ullinskey said:
I was very impressed with last Sunday. I did not catch the first race as I was watching Nazzzcar car instead, but the second race was awesome! None of those stupid full course yellows, P2s and DPs seemed to be balanced really well now. Looking like it will be a great season! Only complaint is that in recent years this race was 4 or 6 hours. But still, it was entertaining and I understand why they did only 2 2 hours races.

The season varies between long endurance races and short sprints. ALMS used to be that way, as well, except with even more short sprints. Tudor has brought more long events into the mix, probably cues taken from WEC and Blancpain.

Leemstradamus · May 6, 2014

Haven't watched the race yet but from what it sounds like it was a success. Need to finish the six hours of spa first.

Nelson Ullinskey · May 6, 2014

Bernd Graf said:
The season varies between long endurance races and short sprints. ALMS used to be that way, as well, except with even more short sprints. Tudor has brought more long events into the mix, probably cues taken from WEC and Blancpain.

Yeah, I know that and I like that, but this event itself used to be 4 hours and before that 6.

Bernd Graf · May 6, 2014

I think the reason is because the season gets tight in places, some teams are down drivers, and to stay within the new rules, they had to cut back some of the race times. So many of the series coincide with others around the world...Marco Holzer races for Falken now as well as Porsche in WEC, they have him and they don't at times. Plus the season gets busier in places, and having a bunch of long races back to back kills the teams I imagine. At least that's my best guess.

Nox · May 14, 2014

I'm finally catching up with the races (I still have to watch Laguna Seca, but I just finished Long Beach), and so far I have to say it's been a pretty disappointing season.

The DPs just... no. Sebring was the Safety Car Endurance. Long Beach was the United Commercial Championship. Seriously, commercials every 10 minutes, I think I heard the Fox Sports theme more than I heard the German national anthem in the entire 2013 F1 season. I know american sports have a lot of that, but this was really too much even by those standards.

I hear Laguna Seca was a bit better, and I'll keep watching the season. I'm not being negative, I'm still keeping my fingers crossed and hoping the season improves. Sad to say though that as it stands, if I started having less time to watch motor sports, the Tudor championship would be the first one I dropped without question.

Nelson Ullinskey · May 14, 2014

Andrew James said:
I'm finally catching up with the races (I still have to watch Laguna Seca, but I just finished Long Beach), and so far I have to say it's been a pretty disappointing season.

The DPs just... no. Sebring was the Safety Car Endurance. Long Beach was the United Commercial Championship. Seriously, commercials every 10 minutes, I think I heard the Fox Sports theme more than I heard the German national anthem in the entire 2013 F1 season. I know american sports have a lot of that, but this was really too much even by those standards.

I hear Laguna Seca was a bit better, and I'll keep watching the season. I'm not being negative, I'm still keeping my fingers crossed and hoping the season improves. Sad to say though that as it stands, if I started having less time to watch motor sports, the Tudor championship would be the first one I dropped without question.

I used to feel the same way about the DPs until I watched Laguna Sega. Racing is damn good, but the commercials are a problem, I do agree with you there. Watch and please post your thoughts

Nelson Ullinskey · Jun 2, 2014

What a race at Detroit on Saturday! That finish in the Prototype class... man that was some awesome stuff. I'll post a link when a video is posted and I find it.

Matt Horst · Jun 8, 2014

Nelson Ullinskey said:
What a race at Detroit on Saturday! That finish in the Prototype class... man that was some awesome stuff. I'll post a link when a video is posted and I find it.

Just watched the replay of the broadcast,what a great race and finish!

Link of the replay here.

Jari Vinnari · Jun 29, 2014

United sportscar live broadcast from Watkins Glen is now running.
http://www.imsa.com/camera/united-sportscar/live-broadcast

Frederic Schornstein · Jun 29, 2014

That was so disappointing...

johnnymat · Jul 1, 2014

Frederic Schornstein said:
That was so disappointing...

I thought the race was really enjoyable. It was pretty clean racing with few yellows until the end. Seeing 53 cars on the track at the same time was fun.

I have to feel for the Oak Racing P2 car; I thought they had it until late in the race.

Frederic Schornstein · Jul 1, 2014

johnnymat said:
I thought the race was really enjoyable. It was pretty clean racing with few yellows until the end. Seeing 53 cars on the track at the same time was fun.

I have to feel for the Oak Racing P2 car; I thought they had it until late in the race.

That was only in regards to the end. I only managed to watch the last hour and it was such a shame. They can't let all the traffic through, because the P2 has no chance then.

johnnymat · Jul 1, 2014

Frederic ;
You're right. Once the DP car jumped Brundle's P2 car near the end, the race was essentially over.
The P2 car was much faster through most of the course , but they're slower to get the tires up to temperature on the restarts. Brundle was hitting the steering wheel in frustration and yelling over the radio.
The balance of performance is pretty close between the DP's and P2's but there is still work to be done.

speedrcr · Jul 15, 2014

Hey did anyone see the race at "previously known as Mosport" or "Canadian Tire Motorsport Park".

I'm a fan of the Porsche Factory team in the past, but this year they are getting plagued by incidents left and right with being "overly" aggressive.

I was kinda pissed they bumped 1st place GTD just to gain, wait for it....nothing in the last 30sec...wtf??

I noticed that Patrick Long while driving was very clean but Michael Christensen seems to be the guy that was overly aggressive and caused a couple moments of contact. IMO what a donkey's be-hind.

Am I the only one that noticed this? I was quite pissed they aced out Park Place's (no. 73 GTD) fight for first that they held on to strong from the Viper halfway through the race.

Then the "moment of the race" was awarded to the Viper team for making the pass that the 912 opened a big hole for with the contact.

Watched the race last night on the DVR and overall was a tricky but good race.

I'm not too impressed with how TUDOR is going this season and the officiating, especially against Turner with a nut not in a box???

They definitely need to step up their game with the marshaling...but then again, I'm just watching this via TV and not there.

I wonder if I can become a marshal at a race, at least I'd know the difference between Michelin's and Conti's; aggressive contact vs accidental, and be watching the race.

We can be thankful at least there was no Yellow flag during the race and no one got hurt "during" the race. Hope Boris Said and Whelen Motorsports make a speedy return.

Excuse my rant....

Frederic Schornstein · Jul 27, 2014

It is really a joke. Just watched a bit the race from Indy and the Action Express car didn't get a penalty for its stupid start. First kicking the Texcel car on the straight making him lock up and missing T1 completely and then turning around the OAK Racing P2 and no penalty for that?!?! Sorry I usually hate penalties, but here at RD I might even get my license suspended when I do such a stupid thing in a club race and don't wait for the cars I crashed.

Start is at 6min

Calum McLure · Jul 31, 2014

So more than half way into the season what are peoples opinions on this? I watched the first couple of races and wasn't impressed, most other people seemed to be the same.

Frederic Schornstein · Aug 1, 2014

Calum McLure said:
So more than half way into the season what are peoples opinions on this? I watched the first couple of races and wasn't impressed, most other people seemed to be the same.

Yeah, I havent watched that much, but what I saw was bad driving. DP's pushing LMP2's around, which are now balanced, but they would need diffrent tyres or something to make them competetive on restarts. Some races had way too much yellow and the cautions were pretty long. I still watch it a bit, but not impressed with most I have seen.