Multimatic Motorsports Nears GS Title With Fifth VictoryTexans Mosing, Foss Win ST In Porsche; Mazda Takes Point Lead Billy Johnson and Scott Maxwell scored an impressive victory in Friday’s Circuit of The Americas 150, winning their fifth race of the season in the No. 15 Multimatic Motorsports Ford Shelby GT350R-C. They extended their lead in the quest for the IMSA Continental Tire SportsCar Championship Grand Sport (GS) title in a race run in over 90-degree heat.It was the 22nd career victory for Johnson – tying him with Matt Plumb atop the all-time list – and 15th for Maxwell, who tied Eric Curran and Terry Borcheller for eighth.“That’s definitely a very special win today,” Johnson said. “I’ve been in the series a very long time, and to be able to tie Matt Plumb like that is a highlight of my career and being a part of this series. Scott checked out and put some distance between himself and the No. 33. We’ve never had the out-right pace all season, so to go out and pace like that and have perfect stops really helped us win this race. It’s everyone who touches the car, whether they are over the wall, or back in the shop, it takes everyone to come away with results like that.”The pair led 55 of the 58 laps – including the final 16 – with Johnson taking the checkered flag 34.517 second ahead of Trent Hindman, driving the No. 12 Bodymotion Racing Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport started by Cameron Cassels. Maxwell won his series-leading fifth TOTAL Pole Award on Thursday and led the opening 21 laps before turning the car over to Johnson.CJ Wilson Racing drivers Danny Burkett and Marc Miller provided the toughest challenge for the lead Ford, running second for much of the event before suffering a broken suspension part with only 21 minutes remaining in the No. 33 ONE Capital Management/MotorOilMatters.org Porsche Cayman GT4 Clubsport.Paul Holton and Pierre Kleinubing both led laps and finished third in the No. 76 C360R Ford Shelby GT350R-C.Entering the season finale at Road Atlanta 150 on Saturday, Sept. 30, Maxwell and Johnson unofficially lead Burkett and Miller by 31 points, 295-264, and can clinch the title by meeting the 45-minute minimum drive time requirement.Texans Win ST In Porsche, Huge Points Swing In ST Sees Freedom Autosport Mazda Take ControlTexans Jeff Mosing and Eric Foss won the trophy in Street Tuner (ST), with the drivers of the No. 56 Murillo Racing/Mosing Motorcars Porsche Cayman keeping their championship hopes alive with their second victory of the season.Mosing passed Owen Trinkler in the No. 44 CRG-I Do Borrow Nissan Altima with 44 minutes remaining, and led the final 18 laps.“Once I knew I had enough fuel, I put the pedal down,” said Foss, a resident of Fort Worth, while Mosing resides in Austin. “Living in Texas, this heat is a challenge at all times and I might need to think about a cool suit. This was one of the toughest I’ve been in.”It was the fourth career victory for both Foss and Mosing.Chad Gilsinger and Cameron Lawrence took second in the No. 92 HART Honda Civic Si, 17.823 seconds behind at the checkered flag. Greg Strelzoff and Connor Bloum finished a season-best third in the No. 19 RS1 Zero Lag Communications/Intervision Porsche Cayman.Chad McCumbee and Stevan McAleer entered the race trailing the lead by six points in the standings, but emerged on top after finishing eighth in the No. 25 Freedom Autosport ModSpace Mazda MX-5. The pair led three times for 24 laps before losing all but second and fifth gears in the latter stages of the race.View full results via Al Kamel Systems at Results.IMSA.comNOTEBOOKFormer championship leaders Nick Galante and Spencer Pumpelly dealt with a loose shifter cable on the opening lap in the No. 17 RS1 Legistics/RickieFowler.org Porsche Cayman that resulted in a long visit behind the wall. The car returned 18 laps down, improving five positions to finish 22nd. Unofficially, McCumbee and McAleer have 240 points, followed by Galante/Pumpelly with 232 and Mosing/Foss with 231.“Unfortunately, something broke in the shift cable on the recon lap, and we took Nick in to fix it and lost a lap,” Pumpelly said of the problems for the No. 17 RS1 Porsche at the start. “We sent him back out and it happened again, so we realized we had to take him back to the hauler. The part the guys replaced was brand new; the RS1 guys did so much work to make this car good. They’ve put a ton of effort into this. It’s disappointing and frustrating, but these things happen in racing.”Sarah Cattaneo and Trinkler both took turns leading ST before Trinkler pulled off course with 31 minutes remaining in the No. 44 CRG-I DO Borrow Nissan Altima with overheating problems. Cattaneo qualified second and led three times for 14 laps – including the opening eight.Tyler Cooke captured the fourth TOTAL Pole Award for No. 84 BimmerWorld Racing OPTIMA Batteries BMW 328i in Thursday’s qualifying. However, the car co-driven by James Clay developed an engine issue in the opening minutes and made two early pit stops, falling out of contention.“We went out on the warm-up laps and had a very slight miss under moderate throttle,” said co-driver and BimmerWorld team owner James Clay. “It started clearing up, but then when we went full throttle we just had a miss, and couldn’t get rid of it. We changed plugs, changes coils. It’s something electrical and unfortunately we couldn’t fix it today.”Brent Mosing had a mechanical problem on Lap 1 and tagged the barrier in Turn 12 in the No. 65 Murillo Racing BMW 328i. That brought out the lone caution of the event as the final 56 laps were run under the green flag.Other ST contenders forced to the paddock during the opening stint included Michael Johnson with fuel pump failure in the No. 54 JDC-Miller Motorsports Universal Coating BMW 228i, and Liam Dwyer, who had a broken axle in the No. 26 Freedom Autosport SemperFiFund.org Mazda MX-5. The Freedom team repaired the car, with Andrew Carbonell returning to bump-draft his ailing points-leading teammate McAleer during the final stages of the event.