Elkhart Lake, Wisc. (5 August 2017) \u2013 Michael Shank Racing\u2019s No. 86 Acura NSX GT3 will start the Continental Tire Road Race Showcase from the fourth row on Sunday after Ozz Negri qualified the car seventh on the grid. The event marks Round 9 of the 2017 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.<\/p>\n
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Highlighting the competitive nature of the GTD category, Negri\u2019s quick lap of 2:07.469-seconds in the chrome red liveried Acura machine was within hundredths of a top-five starting spot.<\/p>\n
\u201cLess than a tenth would have put me fifth and I\u2019m pretty sure I had that,\u201d said Negri, who shares the No. 86 Acura NSX GT3 with Jeff Segal. \u201cI locked up on my quick lap going into Turn 5. That\u2019s how important the perfect lap is. We made good changes from the morning practice to the qualifying![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.michaelshankracing.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/080517_RdAm_bcpix217859-300x200.jpg\")
\u00a0session and I felt comfortable with the car. I\u2019m pretty sure we have a little bit more and we will debrief with our engineers. I\u2019m happy with the car but I know there is more we can get out of our Acura NSX GT3. I\u2019m very confident that we can make it quicker. It\u2019s just a shame that it\u2019s such a very small difference in lap time that cost us a few spots.\u201d<\/p>\n
The No. 93 Acura NSX GT3 sustained damage during Saturday morning\u2019s practice session which saw the car of Andy Lally and Katherine Legge unable to qualify. The Michael Shank Racing crew has set to work to repair the No. 93 ahead of Sunday morning\u2019s warm up session.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m happy with how the car held up,\u201d said Team Owner Mike Shank of the heavy impact. \u201cWe can\u00a0rebuild. It\u2019s just too bad. It\u2019s racing and sometimes this happens. I\u2019m sorry that we have to go through this with all of the guys, but this a track where we can definitely make up positions, like we have all year, in the pits. We can still hopefully have a top-five showing if all goes well. We\u2019ll see.\u201d<\/p>\n
With the potential for rain in the forecast for Sunday\u2019s race \u2013 the 2 hour, 40 minute race could play into the favor of the Michael Shank Racing team.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were doing mock qualifying run and the tires were just up to pressure I was on a decent first lap when I got on the gas on the curb and it shot me into the inside wall,\u201d said Legge of the practice incident. \u201cI\u2019m just gutted. I feel bad for the guys because they have a lot of extra work now. I know these things happen and everyone on the team has been so amazing about it. It\u2019s a testament to how strong the Acura NSX GT3 is. We\u2019ll start at the back of the grid but with the rain, it may make it easier to overtake. Hopefully we can come away with a top-five \u2013 that\u2019s the goal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sunday will see a 20-minute warm up session at 8:30 AM CT (9:30 AM ET).<\/p>\n
The team will host the Austin Hatcher Foundation auction at the Michael Shank Racing transporter at 11:15 AM Central Time with several items up for auction \u2013 including a right Rocker Panel, signed visors, and race-worn gloves and boots.<\/p>\n
The Continental Tire Road Race Showcase goes green at 1:35 PM Central Time (2:35 PM ET) with LIVE coverage beginning on FS1 at 1:30 PM CT (2:30 PM ET).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Elkhart Lake, Wisc. (5 August 2017) \u2013 Michael Shank Racing\u2019s No. 86 Acura NSX GT3 will start the Continental Tire Road Race Showcase from the fourth [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":623,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-622","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-meyer-shank-racing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=622"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":624,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/622\/revisions\/624"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/623"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=622"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=622"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=622"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}