Long Beach, CA
The Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach marked the third round of the season, and the No. 23 Aston Martin THOR Team Valkyrie showed real improvement on the streets that gave the team trouble a year ago.
Ross Gunn qualified seventh and ran the opening stint, pitting on lap 14 to hand the Valkyrie to Roman. A caution on lap 30 bunched the field and set up a restart with Roman fourth on track — right where the team wanted to be. But contact from another competitor at Turn 1 sent Roman scrambling to avoid the tire barrier, and the Valkyrie fell a lap down in the process. Roman brought the car home ninth, completing 69 of 70 laps.
"The improvements since Long Beach last year were evident from first practice through the race," Gunn said. "We took a gamble early on strategy that was due to pay off, but unfortunately some desperate contact prevented us from fourth place."
It was a frustrating way to lose what looked like a strong result, but the pace was real. The team carries that momentum into the next round of the season.
