BimmerWorld Racing’s Devin Jones and Nick Galante catapulted to the top of the Street Tuner (ST) point standings of the IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Challenge series with their second victory of the season on Saturday at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park. Their No. 81 Veristor/Legistics BMW 328i (F30 chassis) also leads the class’s VP Fuels Front Runner Award standings at the season’s halfway point.
Jones, of Mooresville, N.C., won the ST class pole Saturday with a time of 1:31.378, setting a new track record. He immediately broke away from the pack, building up as much as a 40-second lead during the first half of the two-hour race. Jones also set the class’s fastest race lap on lap seven with a time of 1:32.944.
But the victory was not certain for the BMW team until the very end of the race, as a full-course caution on lap 46 obliterated its huge lead. Galante was second until he took the lead for the final time just six laps from the end when the leading MINI stopped off course due to mechanical issues after contact. The race stayed green as the MINI was removed, and that sealed the victory for the BMW squad. Galante took the checkered flag with a 5.205-seconds margin of victory over the runner-up.
“First, I have to thank BimmerWorld and all the guys who got the cars turned over in time to race here at Mosport. It’s always a quick turn-around, so I have to thank those guys. We had speed all weekend and were really fast right off the trailer. It made my job pretty easy. I was able to just go out there and get a pretty big gap. We were hoping it would stay green, but a caution came out there at the end and still we were able to pull it off. It’s just a huge win and really good points day for us, and we’re really looking forward to Lime Rock.” - Devin Jones
“It was a perfect weekend. Devin did most of the hard work there with the pole position and new track record and the gap in the field that he managed. I think it was a 40-second gap when he handed me the car, which was awesome. - Nick Galante