In her 4th seasonal race, Julia Landauer claimed her best NASCAR Pinty's career result with 10th at CTMP.
Last weekend NASCAR Pinty's tenth round was held at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park, in Bowmanville, Canada.
The Canadian stock car series, as per tradition, provided highly spectacular racing to the many local enthusiasts: the action-packed race was also frequently interrupted by yellow flags, as soon as lap 3, when Ryan Klutt stopped at turn one.
When the race resumed three laps later, caution came out again shortly, when on lap 9 American Julia Landauer was hit by compatriot Chandler Smith in the Chevrolet #26.
Landauer, starting from the 18th grid position, was at her 4th seasonal start in the Pinty's series, running previously at Jukasa and at Saskatoon. The 27-year old driver from New York was forced back into the pitlane with huge damage to the rear of the #28 Dodge and lost 2 laps from the leaders as her crew tried to fix the aftermath of the crash.
At the front of the field, Ranger, Klutt and then Dumoulin took the lead away from early front-runner Lacroix, with in between some more interruptions for debris until lap 37.
Landauer benefitted from the first free pass under the third full course yellow to regain one lap, and then was able to rejoin the lead lap on lap 37, as Larry Jackson and TJ Rinomato crashed heavily on the main straight and brought out a lenghty caution.
In the meantime, Alex Tagliani had took the lead of the race from JF Dumoulin, while Julia Landauer started to climb the order position after position despite the visibly damaged car.
The lady driving the TechForce Foundation entry managed to move up from 22nd to 10th in the last ten laps, as the race was extended due to NASCAR overtime.
Tagliani always had the better restarts and led the field until the very last corner; when everyone thought the former Indycar driver could bring home his second seasonal win, it was a late lunge from Kevin Lacroix to deny him the top step of the podium.
Lacroix, protagonist of other daring moves on the inside of turn 10 in the closing stages, gambled one last attempt on Tagliani, sending the latter in the grass of the last corner and taking the checkered flag to take his fifth CTMP win.
Julia Landauer crossed the finish line in tenth position, claiming her best result in the Pinty's Series despite the troubled start of her race:
“I’m glad we were able to get a top-10 after an unfortunate start to the race." - said Landauer. "After being crashed and going two laps down, my team worked their butts off and I hustled on track to get those two laps back and finish in the top-10."
"We never gave up and I’m pumped up to go see what we can do at NHMS and Jukasa! Thank you to The TechForce Foundation for riding along with us this week.”
As the Canadian NASCAR series will now head to St.Eustache Autodrome, Landauer will be back on track for the last two rounds of the championship at New Hampshire Motor Speedway and Jukasa.
In Julia's words:
"We never gave up and I’m pumped up to go see what we can do at NHMS and Jukasa! "
Ph credits: Matthew Manor for NASCAR