Simon Gregg Wins First Trans Am Race - Bob Stretch Answers Back In TA2

May 26, 2012

Simon Gregg Wins First Trans Am Race - Bob Stretch Answers Back In TA2

Great weather, great fans and an equally great Trans Am race took place at the annual Memorial Day Weekend at Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Connecticut.  But no one was celebrating more than Trans Am veteran driver, Simon Gregg driving the No. 59 Derhaag prepared Gregg Motorsport Corvette. 

 
Enjoying is first win in 99 starts, Gregg paid tribute to his team, his family and expressed an emotional personal satisfaction in adding to the racing heritage of his family name. Simon is the son the late, great, Peter Gregg. The senior Gregg himself a winner of 22 Trans Am events.
 
"This feels really good," said Simon. "I feel proud for the team, I'm proud for myself and I'm proud for the Gregg family name."
 
"I was definitely worried about Peterson at the end there," added Simon. "I didn't know what would happen with the restart with only two laps to go. That brings out the aggressive nature in drivers. I got a good restart, covered the inside and after that it was single file."
 
Tony Ave in the No. 4 Lamers Motor Racing Corvette started from the pole and was the early leader. While building a 6.5 second lead over  Doug Peterson in the No. 87 3Dimensional.com Corvette, Tony would relinquish the lead on lap 43 due to a clutch failure.
 
Moving into the lead, Doug Peterson had a mirror full of Simon Gregg. Simon continued to close the gap. By lap 51 only .533 seconds separated the two Corvettes. On lap 52 Peterson bobbled coming through Big Bend and Simon eased by. 
 
Peterson would have one more chance as the double yellow came out on lap 56. The green flag was thrown on lap 64 with two laps to go. Peterson and now third place Amy Ruman in the No. 23 McNichols Corvette took off after Gregg. Ruman got in a little deep at turn one, but would recover and hang on to third place. Peterson would wind up with the best seat in the house to witness Simon Gregg's first Trans Am win.
 
In Trans Am 2, Bob Stretch took the 98 Fix Rim Camaro flag-to-flag for the win over second place Pete Halsmer in the number 12 CTEK Charger Camaro. Stretch was determined that there would not be a repeat of last week's Canadian Tire Motorsport Park Trans Am where Halsmer chased him down toward the end of the race. This week Stretch was ready and reversed the finishing order delegating Halsmer to second. Third place went to Mike Wilson in the 08 Wilson's Carpet Chevrolet Monte Carlo.
 
"Halsmer out qualified me by quite a bit," said Stretch. "I was glad to get out in front of him and just did what I could to hold him off. Lime Rock is tough to set up for, it's not like any other race track out there. We put a little bit different set up on it, it was a little bit of a gamble for us but I think it paid off."
 
Fans kicked off the day's events with a driver autograph session featuring Lime Rock Park legend, Sam Posey. Prior to unleashing the awesome 850hp Trans Am cars, fans where treated to an up-close and personal view of the machinery as they walked the Trans Am grid.
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