OSTELLA PODIUM VANISHES DURING PENALTY STOP AT ROAD AMERICA
TUDOR United SportsCar Championship rookie David Ostella and teammate James French were confident their Performance Tech Motorsports team could secure a podium finish today at Road America after consecutive fourth-place finishes at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Watkins Glen International in recent weeks.
French took the green flag first at the historic 14-turn, 4.048-mile circuit and ran a speedy stint, moving the No. 38 Performance Tech Motorsports Prototype Challenge car up to second place in class after starting fifth. Ostella swapped seats with French during a yellow flag pit stop, returning to the course fifth in class.
Ostella immediately began moving his way up through the field with some very fast laps, including the fastest race lap in class at that point in the race. While advancing to the front, he encountered contact overtaking Colin Braun for third position. Race officials subsequently penalized Ostella for the contact.
“Definitely not the day we were hoping for coming into the weekend,” Ostella said. “The Performance Tech guys gave James (French, Ostella’s teammate) and me a phenomenal car and James had an awesome stint before we made the driver change under the yellow. We were definitely fast out there and had the second fastest lap of the race before we got penalized for contact, which pretty much ruined our day.”
A well-timed pit stop by the Performance Tech team secured first place in class with a significant gap on the competition, but it was given up while serving a stop-and-go plus 60-seconds penalty. With a fast car in his hands, Ostella’s only hope was a long stint of green flag racing, which never materialized. Ostella managed to pull together a sixth-place finish for the team.
“We could have probably made up the difference as fast as we were, but the yellows were just too long for us to have a chance,” Ostella said. “The guys have really shown how fast we can be, so we are definitely looking forward to the next race at VIR.”
The next TUDOR Championship event for Ostella and his Performance Tech Motorsports team is the Oak Tree Grand Prix on Sunday, Aug. 24 at Virginia International Raceway.
For more information or to donate to Dash from Breast Cancer, click the following link: davidostella.com/dash-from-breast-cancer/. Keep up with Ostella’s on track progress by following him on Twitter at @OstellaCorsa and Facebook. For personal updates from Ostella, follow him on Twitter at @davidostella.