Swapping paint, banging wheels and using every inch of the racetrack has been the order of the day as the ModSpace American Le Mans Series Monterey event reached the half way mark after three hours.

While Guy Smith and Dyson Racing held the overall lead in LMP1, the battle for the GT honors was still being fiercely contested between the Risi Competizione Ferrari and Flying Lizard Motorsports Porsche.

Toni Vilander had made his way through to the front past early race leader BMW, but soon had Joerg Bergmeister on his tail.

The Porsche driver made a move past Vilander heading up to The Corkscrew only for the Finn to dive down the inside – using a big chunk of kerb and trackside scenery in the process.

After lots of paint swapping, Vilander regained the lead only for Bergmeister to make a similar move eight minutes before the half way point of the race.

Dirk Mueller held third for BMW after three hours. Delayed cars included the No. 17 Porsche with water pump issues and the No.55 BMW with a flat tire.

Canadian hotshot Kyle Marcelli stalked down and passed CORE autosport’s Rudy Junco to take the LMPC class lead. Junco held on to second – keeping CORE in the championship lead over Genoa Racing’s Eric Lux.

Elton Julian was third in the car he shares with Lux, but the duo’s third driver Michael Guasch may not see any action after suffering a injury in the pits – apparently taking a tumble off the pit wall.

Class veteran Gunnar Jeannette and former Le Mans winner Andy Wallace are scheduled to take over the two CORE cars for the final stint.

The debut of the new LMP2 machine of Level 5 Motorsport looked promising with the new HPD engine/chassis combo running eighth overall.