GMG Racing and team drivers Kyle Washington and Tom Sargent were once again the pacesetters in the No. 32 GMG Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R Evo in Sunday’s three-hour SRO GT World Challenge America powered by AWS race at Circuit of The Americas (COTA) but settled for a fourth-place Pro-Am finish after being caught out in an early safety car period. The race was immediately slowed by back-to-back full-course cautions, the second of which saw the teams that went on to fill the Pro-Am podium a little under three hours later all manage to pit before the safety car took to the track.

Starting driver Washington was one of several competitors across all three competing GT World Challenge classes that missed out on a chance to pit with the early leaders. Remarkably, the remaining two hours and 40 minutes of the race were clean and green all the way, and Washington and Sargent came up just short in making up the nearly one minute gap to the leaders.

“It is definitely what everybody calls ‘one of those racing things,’ but no one expected the last two hours plus of the race to go entirely green,” said GMG Racing Founder and Principal James Sofronas. “We tried to get in the pits with the others during that caution but paid the price the entire race. Still, Kyle never quit pushing and Tom showed again he is the fastest guy in the series and why he has already won four races this year in Porsches around the world. Fourth is still good points, and the championship battle is all on now, but this was a tough one to take. We will shift the focus to Sebring two weeks from now and get back on the top step of the podium.”

Sargent set the fastest race lap of 2:04.138 in his flat-out an attempt to close the gap.

“When you’re doing a championship, winning is amazing but every race is just maximizing, even maximizing your bad days,” Sargent said. “For us, it shouldn’t have been a bad day, but because of the timing of the safety car, it ended up being a bad day. So, we made the most of it and got back to P4. I don’t know how many seconds we regained, 40 or 50 seconds in a pretty short period of time, really quick. The guys did a good job on the strategy, we did the best we could, but it just wasn’t our day today. I expected a few more safety cars, considering how hot and greasy it was, but that’s just the way it is.”

Meanwhile, Washington has moved into the championship conversation in not only GT World Challenge but the GT America powered by AWS sprint race series as well for the second straight year. Washington finished second in Sunday’s final 40-minute GT America sprint of the weekend for his second GT America race runner-up showing of the short season to date. Memo Gidley has opened up a large gap on the field with an undefeated four race win streak, but GMG Racing and Washington are in the best position to pounce if the former series champion falters.

Washington returns to Rounds 5 and 6 of the GT America championship at Sebring in two weeks, a track on which he scored a GT America race victory last year.

Up next for SRO America is indeed the full weekend of competition at Sebring International Raceway, May 8 – 10, where both GT America and the third GT World Challenge America three-hour race of the weekend highlight the full weekend schedule.