Michael Valiante drove the Honda of America No. 93 Civic SI to a second checkered flag in the last three races in the Grand American Continental Tire sports car series on Sunday.
Valiante took over the car after a bad pit stop dropped the No. 93 Honda from third to 13th place.
Valiante took the lead from eventual runnerup Pierre Kleinubing in a Mazda Speed 3 on the 33rd lap and led the rest of the way, posting a racehigh 27 lead laps to claim the team's second win in the street tuner class at the Continental Tire 150 at Watkins Glen, New York, the team's third podium finish in less than a month
"It's great to be on a roll. Hopefully we can keep it up," said Valiante on Monday.
"Pierre Kleinubing was really good coming up the Esses and into the Inner Loop. I was able to hold him off two or three times before I realized I had to get a really good run in the last corner through Turn 1 so I could hold off his attack. It was very difficult," said Valiante in a Grand Am press release.
"It was a good day for points, but I was trying to win no matter what," said Kleinubing, the new ST points leader. "Every time I got close to Valiante, he dug deeper and pulled away."
Valiante and co-driver Chad Gilsinger claimed HART's first ST win of the season series at MidOhio in June. The pair then placed second at Road America in Wisconsin last week.
The three consecutive podium finishes moved the HART No. 93 car into the top 10 in the overall series' team standings.
This weekend, Valiante will be racing for JDX Racing in a Porsche with at the American Le Mans Northeast Grand Prix at Lime Rock Park, Connecticut.
