16.03.2008 TWELVE HOURS OF SEBRING - 12 Hour/finish
report
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After 12 hours 3 minutes and 46 seconds the #5 VICI
Racing Porsche 911 GT3 RSR crossed the finish line
of the 56th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring on
Saturday night, having overcome all the dramas that
were thrown at it during the closing hours of the
race. As dusk rapidly rolled in last night the #5
car first suffered a puncture on track, then power
steering failure, and on top of that, in the final
hour, a half shaft failure. The professionalism and
dedication of the VICI Racing crew saw the battered
car repaired and able to race to the chequered flag
for an impressive 6th place finish in GT2. Put
together in record time, the focus of this week
centred on a tire development program for Kumho
Tire, and the performance, in the words of Team
President, Ron C. Meixner, “exceeded our
expectations.”
The team went into the closing quarter of the race
in excellent shape (7:00 PM – 4th position, 223
laps), having run for several hours in a podium
paying position. At 7:02 PM (8 hr 57 min) Nathan
Swartzbaugh brought the Porsche into the pits for
routine driver change, fuel and four tires. Craig
Stanton took over but just ten minutes later (7:14
PM, 9 hr 9 mins) he suffered a puncture around turn
10, believed to be debris from a prototype which
crashed a couple of laps earlier. He nursed the car
round to the pits where all four tires were changed,
but no fuel, and Craig returned to the track.
At 8:00 PM (10 hours) the #5 car crossed the line
for the 254th time during the race. At 8:13 PM (10
hr 8 min) Craig ended his stint, Nathan taking the
car out with new tires and fuel. After a long,
smooth run all day, the dramas were kicking in a
darkness enveloped the historic circuit. Firstly
Nathan reported that the power steering had failed.
Then the dramas got much worse. At 8:51 PM (10 hr 46
min, 272 laps) the right hand rear half shaft failed
and Nathan brought the car back to the paddock where
the well drilled crew immediately swung into action.
Just 37 minutes after going behind the pit wall, the
#5 car returned to the track with Craig back in the
car for the final half hour. No further issues
arose, and when the chequered flag dropped on the
56th edition of the Twelve Hours of Sebring and the
sky erupted in fireworks, the #5 VICI Racing Porsche
911 GT3 RSR crossed the line 6th in GT2 having
completed 286 arduous laps of the 3.7-mile, 17-turn
legendary road course.
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As dusk rapidly rolled in last night the #5 car
first suffered a puncture on track, then power
steering failure, and on top of that, in the
final hour, a half shaft failure. |
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After 12 hours 3 minutes and 46 seconds the #5
VICI Racing Porsche 911 GT3 RSR crossed the
finish line of the 56th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of
Sebring on Saturday night, having overcome all
the dramas that were thrown at it during the
closing hours of the race. |
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Ron C. Meixner, President VICI Racing says: “We’re
glad to have reached the finish line in a solid
position despite all the dramas that were thrown at
us during the final hours. The tire development
program has exceeded our expectations all week and
we have made excellent progress, as well as
establishing a good working relationship with Kumho.
We now have to take a long look at this week,
analyse the data and progress, and move the program
forward another big step, to a winning position.”
Roland Wall, Technical Director & Chief
Engineer, VICI Racing says: “We adopted a quite
conservative race strategy for this event with
everything being so new and untried. One stint
at a time for fuel and tires. It worked very
well and everything ran like clockwork all day
and we were able to make progress lap-by-lap,
not just in our learning curve but in track
position, until circumstances beyond our control
intervened. But everyone pulled together and we
reach the finish line in a very respectable
position. Today we really showed the pace we can
achieve, and what this team can achieve. The
crew have worked wonders this week, I cannot
enthuse enough about their professionalism,
dedication and sheer hard work. Everything was
all so integrated it was as if we had all worked
together for years.”
Craig Stanton says: “The race went pretty well.
It was tough out there, really tough, and even
early on in the race offline it was heavy with
debris. I had to be very careful. The puncture
fortunately I was able to control and return the
car to the pits undamaged, while the crew worked
wonders to repair the problems that hit us hard
late on. The Kumho tires were good, and we hit
on some excellent choices all of which we can
build on.”
Nathan Swartzburgh says: “It was a real hard
race, very physical, very dehydrating. I have
steadily got used to the Kumho tires all week
and my lap times continued to improve. We were
able to run consistent, promising, times for
most of the day. The RSR is a great race car, I
love it. The power steering problem made the
work harder, but the crew did so well to fix
everything and get the car back out on the track
in a very short time.”
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