Cape Motorsports powered by ECR was on track to finish out the final days of May, racing around the streets of downtown Detroit. The bumpy course provided a fresh challenge for both drivers, and gave them a chance to show their skills at wheel to wheel battles.

Qualifying was held Saturday afternoon, with the Cape duo split across the two groups. Matteo Nannini was in the first group and was quickest overall with just two minutes remaining, but the times kept falling as everyone’s tires warmed up further. Nannini had another competitor just ahead of him on the road for the final laps, which interrupted his final push attempt. He was fifth quick in his session and earned the tenth starting position. Similarly, Nikita Johnson was fifth fastest in his group and claimed the ninth grid position alongside his team-mate.

When the green flag waved on Sunday to start the race, chaos immediately broke out. As the field dove into the first hairpin turn, multiple drivers at the front of the field locked their brakes and ran into each other. The melee nearly blocked the track, but both Nannini and Johnson were able to wend their way through without even breaking a front wing.

After race control sorted out the running order, Nannini was in sixth and Johnson was in tenth for the restart. Nannini fended off lunges from Max Garcia behind, making his #20 car wide and holding position through multiple attacks. The 22-year-old remained in sixth and built a five second gap to those behind.

Unfortunately, on lap 19 Nannini was issued a blocking penalty by race control. The penalty undid his progress in the first half of the race and dropped him back to 10th position. He traded positions in the rough and tumble mid-pack from then onwards, making a few bold passes along the way and ending his day in 11th place.

Meanwhile, Johnson steadily marched forward through the field after the first lap chaos. He alternated between making passes on track and taking advantage of others’ mistakes to progress further up the order as the laps ticked by. His final position gained was a clean move past Bryce Aron on the long back straight, and by time the checkered flags waved Johnson was up to sixth position.

Johnson’s recovery drive continued his streak of finishing every race this season inside the top six, and ensured he stayed within seven points of the top of the overall standings as the 2026 IndyNXT by Firestone season nears the halfway point.

The team will reconvene just outside of St. Louis in less than one week’s time for the first oval event of the season.

Nikita Johnson:

It was a pretty good race today. Started P10, saw a lot of carnage in the first turn, and got blocked out while trying to get past. After that, I battled my way up to P6. Not the end of the world, got solid points. A few of the other title contenders had rough weekends, so all in all a good weekend. Came out second in points, but we’re not far behind. Time to fight hard on the oval to gain those points back!

Matteo Nannini:

The weekend started off good, and we had good pace in practice and quali. The race was going pretty well at the start, and we avoided the big crash in Turn 1. I was running fourth, then was issued a penalty that ruined our entire race. Not much different I could have done in my opinion, and nothing we can do at this point except to look forward to next week.