The Acura NSX Silver division team of Trent Hindman and Shelby Blackstock scored their second straight overall GT World Challenge America powered by AWS victory Saturday afternoon at Road America. The Mercedes-AMG Silver division team of Russell Ward and Indy Dontje finished second overall and second in class, while the Porsche 911 team of Max Root and Fred Poordad continued to add to their impressive 2020 stats finishing third overall and first in the Am division.

Squadra Corse Ferrari 488 team of Rodrigo Baptista and Martin Fuentes finished fourth overall and first in Pro/Am to take over the championship points lead. For Blackstock and Hindman, it's their second straight overall victory after winning Round 6 at Sonoma.

With the sun shining, weather conditions were ideal for the 90-minute contest at the 4.048-mile, 14-turn circuit. From pole, Dontje in the number 33 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 brought the field to the green flag and launched into the lead. Drama ensued behind him though, as a pair of DXDT Racing Mercedes-AMG machines touched near the end of the front straight. The Pro/Am championship points leading number 04 machine driven by George Kurtz spun and ended up in the gravel outside of turn 1, while the number 63 machine piloted by David Askew continued on. Two turns later Blackstock seized an opportunity to pass for the lead executing a move to the front over Dontje through turn 3. Fuentes, in the Squadra Corse number 1 Ferrari 488 GT3 slotted into third, while Poordad in the number 20 Wright Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 R (991.II) slotted into fourth. With Kurtz's Mercedes beached, race officials issued a full-course yellow. While crews worked to pull Kurtz's machine out of the runoff, Askew would come into the pit and his team checked on the condition of the number 63 Mercedes. Both drivers eventually continued in the race.

On the lap 3 restart, Blackstock launched successfully to again head the field ahead of Dontje, Fuentes and Poordad. From there the leaders held their positions until the pit window opened at the 45-minute mark of the contest. Fuentes and Poordad were the first drivers in to change over to Baptista and Root. The Wright Motorsports team executed an efficient pit stop and the number 20 machine re-entered the race ahead of the #1 machine. Blackstock then entered to changeover to Hindman, while Dontje stayed out coming in just before the 10-minute window closed.

With the pit window closed and the recycling of the charts complete, Hindman continued to lead the race overall up front by 15 seconds on Ward now in the number 33 machine. Root remained in third, Baptista fourth and first in Pro/Am, while Ryan Dalziel, now in the number 63 machine sat fifth overall, and second in Pro/Am and Colin Braun, now in the number 04 machine sixth overall and third in class.

On lap 25, Baptista brought the number 1 machine down pit road to serve a drive through penalty for a pitlane infringement during the changeover from Fuentes. Baptista though held a healthy gap on Dalziel in fourth so it did not affect track position.

At the checkered, Hindman crossed the line over 40-seconds ahead of Ward. Ward finished .638 seconds ahead of Root. Of note, with their third-place class finish, Pro/Am Championship contenders Kurtz and Braun now provisionally sit behind Baptista and Fuentes in the standings heading into Sunday's contest.

Results are provisional until posted final. GT World Challenge America drivers now set their sights on Sunday's 90-minute Round 8 race scheduled to go green at 1:15pm local time. Watch the race live on youtube.com/GTWorld.