{"id":7902,"date":"2025-03-02T11:58:17","date_gmt":"2025-03-02T16:58:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/?p=7902"},"modified":"2025-03-03T11:59:36","modified_gmt":"2025-03-03T16:59:36","slug":"timing-is-everything-for-gonzalez-mazda-mx-5-cup-win-in-st-pete","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/2025\/03\/02\/timing-is-everything-for-gonzalez-mazda-mx-5-cup-win-in-st-pete\/","title":{"rendered":"Timing is Everything for Gonzalez\u2019 Mazda MX-5 Cup Win in St. Pete"},"content":{"rendered":"

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (March 2, 2025)<\/strong>\u00a0\u2013 A well-timed pass on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida helped Tyler Gonzalez (No. 57 BSI Racing) secure the Whelen Mazda MX-5 Cup presented by Michelin Round Four race win. An expertly timed restart contributed to Nathan Nicholson (No. 56 Advanced Autosports) finishing in the runner-up position.<\/p>\n

The second Whelen Mazda MX-5 Cup race of the weekend proved a bit calmer than the first. The field fell into a rhythm after a few laps with Westin Workman (No. 13 BSI Racing), Jeremy Fletcher (No. 22 McCumbee McAleer Racing) and Gonzalez forming the lead pack.<\/p>\n

The trio was able to build a six-second gap to the rest of the field, but a full-course yellow for a disabled car in Turn 10 erased their hard work.<\/p>\n

Farhan Siddiqi\u2019s (No. 95 BSI Racing) car was pressed against the wall for a few laps before it was clear he would not be able get away on his own. Knowing a full-course yellow was a high probability as soon as the incident happened, Gonzalez decided to make his move for the lead before the yellow came out.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all knew it was going yellow,\u201d Gonzalez said. \u201cJeremy [Fletcher] went for the dive bomb, overcooked it just a little bit, and I was able to get do the over under on both of them [Fletcher and Workman].\u201d<\/p>\n

The full-course yellow was music to the ears of Nicholson and Jared Thomas (No. 96 JTR Motorsports Engineering) who were now just behind the leaders.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think I was literally praying for that yellow for 20 minutes,\u201d Nicholson laughed.<\/p>\n

On the restart, Nicholson made a brilliant play to the inside of Turn One, that sent him briefly into the lead. He could only hold off Gonzalez for a lap though, and as the pair entered the final turn complex, it was clear that the win would go to Gonzalez.<\/p>\n

\u201cNathan [Nicholson] and I were able to break away a little bit on those last couple laps, and I was able to make the pass, get around him, and just kind of run my race,\u201d Gonzalez said. \u201cBSI and Classic Mazda gave me a great car. I was able to turn some really fast laps out there and just clicked them off one by one until the end, and that was about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is Gonzalez second win of the year, the first coming at Daytona.<\/p>\n

Nicholson was grateful for his second podium of the weekend.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew there was going to be chaos going in (to the restart) with less than 10 minutes left,\u201d Nicholson said. \u201cI anticipated that and saw Weston go deep on the inside and backed it up and was able to capitalize on the opportunity.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a track I’ve never been to, so two podiums considering that\u2026 Advanced Autosports put the work in over the winter and we showed up with a very fast car.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was also a double podium weekend for Thomas, who further added to his points lead.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe yellow was an opportunity to make up spots, because I wasn’t quite as fast as them, at least on the long run,\u201d Thomas said. \u201cI thought \u2018we’ll see what happens,\u2019 because these restarts are always crazy. Sure enough, it got crazy there at the end, and we made the most of it and got a solid podium.\u201d<\/p>\n

Polesitter Jeremy Fletcher finished fourth and Nate Cicero completed the top five.<\/p>\n

She won the Penske Shocking Performance Award in Saturday\u2019s race and backed it up with another one on Sunday; Sally Mott (No. 15 JTR Motorsports Engineering) went from 30th to 10th in the race, which also made her the highest finishing female driver.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis feels really good,\u201d Mott said. \u201cEspecially considering how the weekend started and not getting a great qualifying. I started almost absolutely last and driving my way up both races and getting a top-10 finish, the top finishing female\u00a0and<\/em>\u00a0hard charge award today is just amazing! If you told me that two days ago I would not have believed it.\u201d<\/p>\n

A new face at the post-race award ceremonies was Chris Haldeman (No. 28 AAG Racing) who finished 16th and accepted the Takumi Award for drivers over the age of 50.<\/p>\n

Both races are available to rewatch anytime on the RACER and IMSA YouTube Channels.<\/p>\n

Next up for Mazda MX-5 Cup is Barber Motorsports Park, in Birmingham Alabama, May 2 \u2013 4.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. (March 2, 2025)\u00a0\u2013 A well-timed pass on the streets of St. Petersburg, Florida helped Tyler Gonzalez (No. 57 BSI Racing) secure the Whelen [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":7903,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,37],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7902","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-mazda-mx-5-cup"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7902","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=7902"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7902\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7904,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7902\/revisions\/7904"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}