Cadillac ekes out Sebring win after late-race melee collects leaders

Colin
By Colin Wood
Mar 20, 2023 | Sebring International Raceway, sebring, 12 Hours of Sebring, Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring

Photograph Courtesy IMSA

Even though the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring is half the length of the Rolex 24 at Daytona, that doesn’t mean fans got half the thrills or the drama.

Less than 20 minutes before the checkered flag waved, the No. 10 Konica Minolta Acura ARX-06 impacted the race-leading No. 6 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963. The No. 7 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963, in third place, was also collected in the scuffle.

The accident opened the door for the No. 31 Whelen Engineering Racing Cadillac V-Series.R to win the race, with the No. 25 Team RLL BMW M Hybrid V8 and the No. 6 Porsche Penske Motorsports 963 finishing second and third for GTP, respectively.

As far as LMP2, the No. 8 Tower Motorsports ORECA nabbed the class win after taking the class lead under a late-race caution. The No. 11 TDS Racing ORECA finished second, with the No. 18 Era Motorsport ORECA placing third.

LMP3–which gets the award for earliest race incident–saw the No. 74 Riley Ligier JS P320 overtake the No. 30 Jr III Racing Ligier after a late caution bunched the field back together. The No. 13 AWA and No. 85 JDC Miller Motorsports Duqueine D08s crossed the line second and third, respectively, after a loose wheel from the No. 51 Rick Ware Racing ORECA totaled the No. 30 LMP3.

The GTD Pro field was seeing plaid at the race finish, with the No. 9 Pfaff Porsche 911 GT3 R securing first–even after an accident in qualifying pushed the car back to the middle of the pack ahead of the race start. The No. 14 Vasser Sullivan Lexus RC F GT3 followed behind for a second-place finish, with the No. 79 WeatherTech Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 bringing up the rear for third.

GTD saw a 1-2 podium finish for the BMW M4, with the No. 1 Paul Miller Racing car winning the class and the No. 96 Turner Motorsport car finishing second. In third place was the No. 92 Kellymoss with Riley Porsche 911 GT3 R.

Watch below for highlights of the action, and click here for the unofficial race results.

 

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Comments
Aaron_King
Aaron_King GRM+ Memberand PowerDork
3/20/23 12:54 p.m.

That was a crazy last 20 minutes of that race.

DirtyBird222
DirtyBird222 PowerDork
3/20/23 1:03 p.m.

You mean the Porsche forced the Acura off the track, thus causing a massive pile up? 

Aaron_King
Aaron_King GRM+ Memberand PowerDork
3/20/23 3:41 p.m.

No, it looked to me like aggressive driving on every ones part collided with traffic and things went sideways.

wvumtnbkr
wvumtnbkr GRM+ Memberand PowerDork
3/20/23 3:54 p.m.
Aaron_King said:

No, it looked to me like aggressive driving on every ones part collided with traffic and things went sideways.

That's how I saw it too.

 

Basically, the car that was the leader made a move to go around slower traffic right where the track kinda narrows.  This also happened at night.  With 20 mins to go.  

 

I'm not sure anybody could have done much different other than simply slowing down and getting single file through there.

 

 

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