Rum Bum Racing take fourth win at Watkins Glen |  |
- Rum Bum Racing take fourth win at Watkins Glen
- APR Motorsport’s Josh Hurley hangs on at the end of CTSCC Watkins Glen
- Audi’s Ekstrom qualifies fourth at DTM Norisring
- Frank Stippler puts APR Audi R8 on front row at Watkins Glen
| Rum Bum Racing take fourth win at Watkins Glen Posted: 01 Jul 2012 07:49 AM PDT In a season where everything seems to be going right for Rum Bum Racing, co-drivers Nick Longhi and Matt Plumb picked up their series-leading fourth victory of the 2012 GRAND-AM Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge in the Continental Tire 150 at Watkins Glen International on Saturday afternoon. Driving the No. 13 Rum Bum Racing Porsche Carrera, Plumb claimed the lead from Gunter Schaldach on Lap 40 of the 59-lap event. He held the lead through two late-race restarts following full-course caution periods and held off a charging Lawson Aschenbach on the final lap to win by 0.318 seconds. “It’s just a team that is working together right now and there is some luck involved,” said Longhi. “We’re not crazy enough to think that it’s all about us, because the level of competition at this point is unbelievable. You have to be perfect and you have to get the strategy perfect.” The victory moved Plumb and Longhi into the lead in the Grand Sport driver standings by one point over John Farano and David Empringham, 193-192, with three races remaining on the 2012 CTSCC schedule. Aschenbach and co-driver Eric Curran came home second in the No. 01 CKS Autosport Chevrolet Camaro GS.R, with Farano and Empringham third in the No. 83 Tower Events Grandstand Seating & Hospitality Sales Porsche Carrera. Next up for the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge is the series’ inaugural race at Indianapolis Motor Speedway on Friday, July 27. - Grand-Am Related posts: You're reading Rum Bum Racing take fourth win at Watkins Glen originally posted on oneighturbo.com. If you've enjoyed this article, be sure and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and YouTube.
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| APR Motorsport’s Josh Hurley hangs on at the end of CTSCC Watkins Glen Posted: 01 Jul 2012 05:05 AM PDT In another wild Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge race, APR Motorsport showed its strength in the ST class again by running with both of its APR VW GTI’s in the top-ten in the late stages of the race. When the checkered flag fell, however, it would only be the no. 161 APR VW GTI of Nate Norenberg and Josh Hurley that would crack the top-ten, as Hurley guided the car to a ninth place finish. After a strong opening stint by Norenberg, Hurley would survive a hectic late-race battle – as well as several restarts following full-course cautions – to finish ninth. The rear bumper, which hung on for dear life in the final stages of the race, was proof of the physical nature of the race. “Ninth is a decent result – we would rather win than be ninth, but we are pretty happy with how the race went,” said Hurley. “It was pretty warm today and I think that hurt our car over the course of the race, so we were kind of hanging on a bit at the end. Nate did a great job to get things started and after the way our race ended last week, it’s nice to get a finish.” Complete APR Motorsport Watkins Glen gallery Troubles started early for the no. 171 APR VW GTI, which won last week’s race at Road America. During the warm-up lap, Cheng reported a loss of power that forced him to come to pit lane before the green flag. The APR Motorsport crew was able to make repairs and send Cheng back out without losing a lap to the ST field. Cheng was able to stay on the lead lap until a full course caution period allowed the team to stop for a full service and put co-driver Aleks Altberg in the car. With good work in the pits and a strong stint by Altberg, the car gained positions and ran as high as sixth before problems surfaced again, halting the car on track during a full course caution. The car would refire, but Altberg had lost most of his track position, and the car would ultimately finish in 21st. “The car was working really well, and we were really happy about how the race was going,” said Cheng. “And then we had some kind of electronic glitch under yellow. It’s really unfortunate, because the team had worked a minor miracle to fix the car earlier in the race to keep us on the lead lap, and Aleks did a great job once we did our driver change. The yellows helped us and we were good on tires and fuel, but then the car shut off. After the high of last week, this is a real low. I’m not sure what else we could do, but we’ll move on to Indy and hope for another good run there.” The next race for the CTSCC is a historic first event – the Brickyard Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, on July 27. That race, on a Friday, will be shown live on SPEED2.com. - APR Motorsport Related posts: You're reading APR Motorsport’s Josh Hurley hangs on at the end of CTSCC Watkins Glen originally posted on oneighturbo.com. If you've enjoyed this article, be sure and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and YouTube.
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| Audi’s Ekstrom qualifies fourth at DTM Norisring Posted: 30 Jun 2012 03:25 PM PDT As expected, the fight for the pole position on the 2.3-kilometer city street circuit between the Dutzendteich Lake and the easyCredit Stadium turned into a battle for thousandths of a second. While in the last free practice session in the morning the quickest twelve cars were within just two tenths of a second the time gaps were again minimal in qualifying in the afternoon with 35 degrees in the shade and track temperatures of more than 50 degrees. “The conditions were definitely extreme today,” said Mattias Ekstrom, who from the first session on was consistently the quickest Audi driver. After best times in Q2 (48.822 seconds) and Q3 (48.861 seconds) the Swede was the last driver to go out on track in the crucial shoot-out for the pole position at which the Audi racer on used tires had to settle for position four (49.369 seconds). “When you’re the fastest driver to go into Q4 of course it’s very disappointing to only be on grid position four in the end,” commented Ekstrom. “Q2 and Q3 went superbly. But in Q4 I simply didn’t have any grip in the tires. At least I’m still on the second row of the grid, so from there anything’s possible. There’s a really large crowd of Audi fans here. I owe them a fantastic fight in tomorrow’s race.” The second-best Audi driver to start into the race will be Edoardo Mortara in his Playboy Audi A5 DTM. The Italian from Audi Sport Team Rosberg, who cheered Italy’s move in to the Euro 2012 finale at the Dutzendteich Lake on Thursday night, is on grid position ten. After the checkered flag had dropped in Q2, Mike Rockenfeller (Schaeffler Audi A5 DTM/Audi Sport Team Phoenix) was still bumped from tenth to eleventh place. Rockenfeller, who had finished the 2012 Le Mans 24 Hours in third place, was only lacking 0.004 seconds to make it into the next qualifying session. Just a tiny bit slower were Adrien Tambay (Audi ultra A5 DTM) and Filipe Albuquerque (TV Movie Audi A5 DTM) on positions twelve and 13. For Miguel Molina (Red Bull Audi A5 DTM), Timo Scheider (AUTO TEST Audi A5 DTM) and Rahel Frey (E-POSTBRIEF Audi A5 DTM), who were eliminated as early as in Q1 and will start from positions 20, 21 and 22, qualifying was a particular disappointment. “After we’ve been consistently showing a solid team performance so far we unfortunately didn’t manage to do that today,” said Head of Audi Motorsport Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich. “Qualifying proved to be as close as expected. Mattias (Ekstrom) made it into Q4 and thus showed that we’re on the right track with the further development of our A5 DTM – because he was consistently fast here throughout the weekend. If you want to be at the very front at the Norisring you’ve got to put all three sectors together perfectly. In Q2 and Q3, Mattias managed to do that, in Q4 he didn’t. On the whole, of course we’re not satisfied to have only two cars in the top ten. But the race will be extremely hard and long – and tomorrow the weather conditions should be completely different. At this point, anything’s still possible.” For race day, the forecast predicts temperatures to drop by around ten degrees compared to the two practice days, plus rain showers. The race covers 83 laps (190.900 kilometers) – a record distance for the DTM at the Norisring. ARD will broadcast live from Nuremberg starting at 13:15, local time. Due to the European Track & Field Championships in Helsinki the race will already start at 13:30.                      - Audi Motorsport Related posts: You're reading Audi’s Ekstrom qualifies fourth at DTM Norisring originally posted on oneighturbo.com. If you've enjoyed this article, be sure and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and YouTube.
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| Frank Stippler puts APR Audi R8 on front row at Watkins Glen Posted: 30 Jun 2012 02:34 PM PDT Proving a quick study to the challenges of the Watkins Glen International circuit, Frank Stippler drove the no. 52 APR Audi R8 Grand-Am to second in the fifteen-minute qualifying session for Sunday’s Sahlen’s Six Hours at the Glen. Stippler’s time of 1:51.018 was set on his first flying lap and would hold up throughout the rest of the session. Stippler will share the car with fellow German Marc Basseng in the six-hour race. “It would have been a dream to qualify the Audi R8 on pole for my first Grand-Am race,” said Stippler. “But the Camaro did a really good time. I had a faster lap going but then a Mazda had spun and that lap was destroyed, and then I didn’t have the opportunity to go for another one. We have been working hard with APR Motorsport and Audi Sport to improve the car. I think tomorrow we’ll have a strong race with me and Marc and we’ll try to improve our position by one!” The team’s no. 51 APR Audi R8, which will be driven by Dr. Jim Norman, Dion von Moltke, and Ian Baas suffered a mechanical failure during the third practice, making contact with the tire wall in the ‘Laces’ section of Watkins Glen. Ian Baas was at the wheel at the time, with the damage causing the car to miss the qualifying session. The team was expecting a strong qualifying performance from the no. 51 car as well. Complete APR Motorsport Watkins Glen gallery “We’ve been making improvements to the car all weekend, and I had just run my best lap of the weekend when we went into the wall,” said Baas, who finished second in the 2006 Sahlen’s Six Hours at the Glen. “I hate it for the guys who have to repair the car, but hopefully we can repay them with a strong run tomorrow. The team has made big improvements to the Audi R8 all season, and it’s definitely a better can than it was in Daytona. I think we’ll have a great car for the six-hour race tomorrow.” The challenge of running two cars in the Rolex Series for the first time is paying off for APR Motorsport, according to team owner Stephen Hooks. APR Motorsport has also entered three cars in this weekend’s Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge race. “Our primary goal for bringing in the second car, Audi Sport, and Marc and Frank, was to put everything on the table to see what kind of result we could get,” said Stephen Hooks. “Having the Audi Sport guys with us this weekend has been a real learning experience, and it’s given us a great chance to go in two different directions with setup, and we’ve learned a lot this week. It was disappointing to have the no. 51 miss qualifying because we expected that car to be very fast in qualifying, but we have high hopes for their performance tomorrow. Dion and Jim have had some momentum over the past few races and hopefully that carries over to tomorrow.” - APR Motorsport Related posts: You're reading Frank Stippler puts APR Audi R8 on front row at Watkins Glen originally posted on oneighturbo.com. If you've enjoyed this article, be sure and follow us on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and YouTube.
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