The No. 10 Konica Minolta Acura ARX-05 team put forth an admirable effort, ultimately finishing in sixth place at   the 2022 Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach. Full-time co-drivers Ricky Taylor and Filipe Albuquerque did everything in their power to tame the bumpy Long Beach Street Circuit for 100 minutes. The Long Beach result brings the team’s points total to 940 and in fourth place in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, having completed three races and the first leg of the "West Coast" swing.

Starting in sixth position, Filipe Albuquerque quickly assumed fifth position when the leader made a mistake 10 minutes into the race. The team opted for a short opening stint, changing two tires, and keeping Albuquerque behind the wheel for a second stint. Impressively, Albuquerque set times similar to the leaders,  leaving an opportunity for massive gains if a full course caution were to come out.

Albuquerque ran as high as second position during his stint, but the needed caution came slightly too late. The team executed their second pit stop of the day and Ricky Taylor assumed his spot behind the wheel with 45 minutes to go, dropping the team back to their starting position of sixth. The first yellow flag of the race flew two minutes later. The caution, caused by a loose curb, bunched up the field and gave Taylor the chance to fight to the checkered, albeit with only two fresh tires. The team restarted the race in fifth position with Ricky in full attack mode. Unfortunately, despite a strong effort, he couldn’t hold off the Cadillac on four fresh tires behind.

“We’ve had better days,” admitted Ricky Taylor. “Unfortunately, Long Beach has been tough to us recently. Today, we just lacked the pace and gambled on the yellow—gambled a bit with our strategy. We did everything we could. All the guys did a great job. It was just hard to make ground today. We had a couple of chances to pass a few guys, but in the end, we finished in sixth. We’ll just have to move on. You can’t win them all. It’s more downs than ups. We’ll go to Laguna and rebound.”

“What a hard day at the office,” lamented Filipe Albuquerque. “We knew that it was going to be hard. Things didn’t go smoothly for us from qualifying onward. In the race, we tried to gamble, and we missed it by two laps. But even then, we had no pace. It’s just amazing how the winners make a mistake and come back and win a race. We’ll keep working and digging. It’s only the third race of the year and maybe the hardest circuit for us. Let’s see how the rest pan out. Laguna should be ours.”

“It’s like I said before,” said Team Owner Wayne Taylor. “Coming here, we’re going to be racing for fifth and sixth. We had to make a big strategy call early in the race. We needed a yellow, but the yellow didn’t come out. That put us right at the back of the field. And that was the end of it. Clearly, the Cadillacs were in a different class. You only had to watch [Sebastian] Bourdais lose almost 30 seconds and still drive back and pass everybody. Anyway, good for them. A tough day for Honda, Acura, and HPD, as this is their weekend. We have to go to Laguna and win.”

The West Coast swing continues for the No. 10 Konica Minolta Acura ARX-05 in two week’s time. Friday, April 29th will mark the start of the Monterey Sports Car Championship Presented by Motul weekend with Practice 1 at 11:30 a.m. ET at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca. Green flag for the one-hour and 40-minute sprint waves at 3:10 p.m. ET on Sunday, May 1st. Full coverage can be streamed on Peacock with network coverage on NBC.

ABOUT KONICA MINOLTA   Konica Minolta Business Solutions U.S.A., Inc. is reshaping and revolutionizing the Workplace of the Future. The company guides and supports its clients’ digital transformation through its expansive office technology portfolio, including IT Services (All Covered), intelligent information management, managed print services and industrial and commercial print solutions. Konica Minolta has been included on CRN’s MSP 500 list nine times and The World Technology Awards recently named the company a finalist in the IT Software category. Konica Minolta has been recognized as the #1 Brand for Customer Loyalty in the MFP Office Copier Market by Brand Keys for fourteen consecutive years, and received Keypoint Intelligence’s BLI 2021 A3 Line of The Year Award and BLI 2021-2023 Most Color Consistent A3 Brand Award for its bizhub i-Series. Konica Minolta, Inc. has been named to the Dow Jones Sustainability World Index for nine consecutive years and has spent four years on the Global 100 Most Sustainable Corporations in the World list. Konica Minolta partners with its clients to give shape to ideas and works to bring value to our society. For more information, please visit us online and follow Konica Minolta on Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn and Twitter. The No. 10 Konica Minolta Acura ARX-05 effort and Wayne Taylor Racing is supported by an outstanding lineup of partners including Harrison Contracting, Acura Motorsports, Hammer Nutrition  and CIT.