Connor Zilisch Goes from Last to First for the Second Time in Five Races; 14-Year-Old TA2 Rookie Ben Maier Scores Third Top-10 of the Season

Overview

Date: Aug. 5, 2023

Event: Big Machine Music City Grand Prix (Round 9 of 13)

Series: Trans Am Series presented by Pirelli

Division: Big Machine Vodka Spiked Coolers TA2 Series

Location: Streets of Nashville, Tennessee

Layout: 2.17-mile, 11-turn temporary circuit

Format: 46 laps or 75 minutes

Weather: Partly cloudy, mid-80s

Winner: Connor Zilisch of Silver Hare Racing

Silver Hare Racing:

  • Connor Zilisch – Started 34th, Finished 1st (Running, completed 38/38 laps)
  • Ben Maier – Started 13th, Finished 9th (Running, completed 38/38 laps)

Noteworthy:

  • Today’s victory was Connor Zilisch’s third of the season and the third of his career. He qualified on the pole during qualifying this morning but was sent to the back of the 34-car grid due to a post-qualifying technical inspection infraction. His victory June 5 in the second race of a weekend doubleheader on the downtown Detroit street circuit also came from the back of the grid after originally qualifying on the pole.
  • Zilisch’s lap of 1:31.350 earned the recently turned 17-year-old the Omalagato Fastest Lap of the Race Award.

Connor Zilisch, Driver, No. 7 Silver Hare Racing Chevrolet Camaro:

“That was wild, to say the least. I can’t say enough about my team. They believe in me, trust me, and they work so hard for me and I couldn’t be more grateful for them, Silver Hare Racing, they do such a good job. Maurice and Laura Hull gave me the opportunity of a lifetime, to come out here and race cars and to fulfill my dream. This is one of the events that I’ve always wanted to win ever since that first year. So to come out here and get that win is super special to me and super special to the guys, as well. They invest a lot, being away from their families. It feels so good to get this win for all my team. I was having radio issues pretty much the whole race, so I didn’t know how long we had, what place I was in at almost any point in the race until toward the end, when my radio came back. That’s when I realized that I had a good shot at this and I’ve just got to have good, clean restarts and hopefully have some green-flag runs so I could get by some of these guys.”

Ben Maier, Driver, No. 75 Gel Blaster/Silver Hare Racing Chevrolet Camaro:

“It went pretty well. I was off to a slow start at the beginning of the weekend – wasn’t that fast, but then I picked up speed in qualifying, qualified 14th. I was running well in the race and made it up to eighth or ninth, but then I made a mistake, blew past a turn and lost a bunch of positions by the time I made it back on track. I made it all the way back up to ninth from about 15th. Made a mistake but recovered from it, which is a good thing. I feel pretty good about how things have been going. Now that I have more and more experience, the more seat time I have, the more comfortable I am. Connor is amazing. He’s done this twice – here and at Detroit. I guess he’s good on street courses. The team is amazing, working so well on the cars, getting everything done. The setups are good. Just looking forward to keep getting better with this Silver Hare team.”

Maurice Hull, Co-Owner, Silver Hare Racing:

“Boy, you talk about ups and downs. We had the fastest car on the track, the best driver on the track, and today was his day. He started in the back, went all the way to the front, kept the fenders on it, didn’t wreck anybody, didn’t hit anything, and he beat everybody there. It was awesome. I’m really proud of this Silver Hare crew, Connor, and everybody in this family for standing together and being strong through this. And then we’ve got a top-10 finish out of our 14-year-old prodigy driver who is just awesome. He was racing guys who are way older and more experienced and he brought it home with all the fenders clean and just ran the fastest laps he’s run all weekend. We’re just blessed to have both of these guys on this team.”

Next Up

The Big Machine Vodka Spiked Coolers TA2 Series competitors have a month-long reprieve before next taking to the track for the 10th round of the 2023 calendar Sept. 8-10 at historic Watkins Glen (N.Y.) International. The Watkins Glen SpeedTour commences Friday, Sept. 8, with a pair of TA2 open test sessions on the 3.4-mile, 11-turn road course. Official TA2 practice is set for the morning of Saturday, Sept. 9, with qualifying late that afternoon. The 30-lap, 75-minute TA2 race is set for 11:05 a.m. EDT Sunday, Sept. 10, with live television coverage provided by MAVTV, and live-streaming video coverage by the Trans Am Series and SpeedTourTV channels on YouTube.

-SilverHareRacing-