Long Beach, Calif. (12 April 2025) – Acura Meyer Shank Racing (“Acura MSR”) w/ Curb Agajanian lost valuable time in the pits early in the race en route to finishing ninth and 11th in the lead GTP category in Saturday’s 50th anniversary Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.
The team qualified both cars on the third row, with Nick Yelloly taking fifth in the No. 93 Acura ARX-06, while Tom Blomqvist started sixth in the No. 60 Acura ARX-06.
Yelloly managed to get out in fourth at the drop of the green flag, despite being hit by a competitor that resulted in left-rear damage. Blomqvist was close behind, running sixth.
Caution flags waved 20-minutes into the 100-minute event, with Yelloly pitting at the first opportunity for a quick stop for driver change and fuel. Blomqvist stayed out to run second and pitted two laps later to swap for Braun and add fuel.
van der Zande was third on the restart with 1:08 remaining, but was told by IMSA to return to the pits so the Acura MSR team could repair the left rear damage. The team changed the bodywork, but the green-flag stop cost the team a lap on the tight 1.968-mile circuit.
The turn of events set the stage for the final hour. In an effort to make up ground, the No. 60 Acura opted to take a second pit stop for tires on Lap 43. Braun gained one position to finish ninth, while van der Zande was unable to make up the lost lap and finished 11th.
Unofficially, Braun and Blomqvist are now sixth in the GTP standings, two positions ahead of van der Zande and Yelloly.
Next up for the WeatherTech Championship is WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca, for the Monterey Sportscar Championship on May 11.
Meyer Shank Racing Driver Quotes:
Tom Blomqvist: “We didn’t really have the pace and we got unlucky. It’s always difficult when you have two cars and have to manage things in the pits. We were behind on track so, we had to sacrifice a little bit by having to pit second on the first round of pit stops. And then unfortunately the other car wasn’t able to capitalize because they had a problem later. It put both of us out of contention. It’s a huge shame because it’s such a short race and there’s really not much you can do to catch up”
Colin Braun: “Bit of a disappointing day for us. We had high hopes with the 50th anniversary of the Acura Grand Prix in the wonderful Acura GTP cars. The guys had good stops. Unfortunately, for most of my stint I was stuck behind the Aston [Martin] – which has a lot of straight-line speed, and it’s pretty hard to pass at a track like this. I was hoping for some more things to come our way strategy-wise but unfortunately the race just kind of played out where it didn’t help or hurt it, it just kind of neutralized everything. I think we did the most that we could with what we had. We’ll look at all the data and come back swinging in Laguna.”
Nick Yelloly: “Not where we wanted to end up finishing. After a promising start, unfortunately we got tapped by a competitor going into the last corner and that forced us to pit a second time to change the body work and we lost our lap. Obviously not what we wanted. We didn’t really have the pace all weekend. But, great effort from the boys and girls within Acura and Meyer Shank and we’ll move on to Laguna in a few weeks.”
Renger van der Zande: “Very disappointing. Being second at the restart and then IMSA called us in to change the tail, I think I would have liked them to give that message before the pit stops so that we would have had a chance to stay in the race. At that point we were completely out of the race. I wish we would have restarted P2 on the restart and could have kept everyone behind us to end up on the podium. Right now the speed difference is a bit too big and hopefully that will change in the future. We will look how we can improve moving forward.”
