15 March 2019 Archives

The starting grid for the 12 hours race is locked

Friday March 15th, 2019Friday March 15th, 2019 Jens Jensen

The qualifying for IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race at Sebring International Raceway was run Friday morning local time. The 17 GTD cars were the first on the track. Trent Hindman in Meyer Shank Racing Acura #86 was the only person to set a time under two minutes, so he grabbed Pole Position ahead of Robert Foley in Turner Motorsport BMW #96 and Pfaff Motorsports Porsche #9 with Zacharie Robichon in P3. It was Hindman’s first Pole Position in the IMSA series. GRT Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini #11 delivered a bit…

Penalties left and right for WEC qualifying

Friday March 15th, 2019Friday March 15th, 2019 Jens Jensen

The stewards at Sebring International Raceway has been busy after qualifying for 1000 Miles FIA World Endurance Championship race. Five penalties were handed out to the drivers – and actually only GTE Pro that managed to avoid changes in their starting grid Racing Team Nederland #29 in LMP2 got their time taken away, since both Frits van Eerd and Nyck de Vries drove too fast in the pitlane. Actually, both drove exactly 66,2 km/h, so it looked like a problem in the pit limiter, since both drivers did exactly the…

Sørensen’s careful optimism

Friday March 15th, 2019Friday March 15th, 2019 Jens Jensen

It wasn’t a fantastic qualifying for Nicki Thiim, Marco Sørensen and Darren Turner in Aston Martin Racing #95 for today’s FIA World Endurance Championship race at Sebring. The Dane train qualified in tenth place in GTE Pro, just ahead of their sister car that closed the field. However, #97 had had some technical problems on the car, which kept Maxime Martin from setting any real laptime. But already before qualifying, Marco Sørensen had no big expectations for the weekend, even though #97 had been the fastest in both FP1 and…

Last minute change of BOP for GT3 cars in VLN Endurance Championship (SP9 and SPX Classes) could lead to GT3’s disappearing from the Nordschleife

Friday March 15th, 2019Friday March 15th, 2019 Stefan Schneider

Emotions have been cooking up boiling hot over the last couple of days with drivers, team principals, and fans in the VLN Endurance Championship at the Nürburgring. While a few weeks ago the issue of too fast lap times of the GT3’s on the North Loop (Nordschleife) was only a topic discussed in some statements (open letter of the DMSB, the German Motorsport Association, followed by statements made by the Race Director of VLN), it was believed from all sides it would not lead to further action. However, the tide…

Incredibly exciting qualifying at Sebring

Friday March 15th, 2019Friday March 15th, 2019 Jens Jensen

The qualifying for 1000 Miles FIA World Endurance Championship race at Sebring International Raceway was run Thursday evening local time, and it would be an exciting event. The twenty GTE cars were the first to go. Jan Magnussen in Corvette Racing #63 was the first car on the track, but it was Ford Chip Ganassi Team UK #67 with Andy Priaulx who set the first laptime, that everyone else had to beat. It seemed so until Ben Barker in Gulf Racing Porsche #86 in GTE Am bilen, who put the…