DAYTONA BEACH, Fla.—The #48 Fall-Line Motorsports BMW M3 has been awarded the victory in the first race of the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge, the BMW Performance 200 held at Daytona International Speedway Friday afternoon.
The #48 BMW finished second to the Turner car on the track, but the Turner car failed post-race inspection due to an unannounced infraction. The rest of the cars advanced one spot up the finishing order.
It was the first CTSCC win for Fall-Line drivers Shelby Blackstock and Ashley Freiberg. Freiberg is the first woman to win overall in CTSCC—and it was her first race in the series.
Freiberg talked about the win on her Facebook page: “Amazing day in the BMW Performance 200 at Daytona! Drove the car from P12 to P5 in my stint and Shelby drove hard to finishing P2 under caution! BUT the 96 car ended up being DQ'ed so we WON!!!
“I am so proud of Shelby and the guys at Fall-Line Motorsports for how hard they have worked. First CTSCC race, first woman to win overall in CTSCC at Daytona! Thank you to all who have made this happen and to all of you who never stop believing in me!!!”
“It’s awesome,” Blackstock told IMSA.com. “I can’t thank the Fall-Line team enough. They gave me an awesome car and made awesome calls to put me in position. I’m pretty speechless right now. I’m a little disappointed I didn’t get to celebrate on the podium, but I couldn’t be happier.”
“Ashley might be a little spoiled now. It took me more than two years to finally win one, and she wins in her first start. I hope she doesn’t think this series is easy. But she did an awesome job today.”
Another Fall-Line Motorsports car, the #46 Trim-Tex/Criocco Ozzimo/Atlas Acon/DFL Interiors BMW M3 driven by John Edwards and Trent Hindman took second.
On the last step of the revised podium went to Michael Marsal and Tom Kimber-Smith in the #97 Turner Motorsport BMW M3.
