ALMS 2010 – Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca – Part 1
Photography by Aaron Kupferman – Motorsportlens.com and Sevan Pulurian
Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca is one of the most famous racetracks in the world and one of the most iconic in the US. Combining California’s notoriously beautiful weather with a long history and the famous Corkscrew turn, Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca is always high up on everyone’s “must see” list.
The American Le Mans Series visited the track for the latest round of the 2010 championship and the six-hour endurance race held plenty of action. Now split into the LMP (prototype), LMPC (spec prototype), GT (semi production based) and GTC (Porsche challenge) classes, the ALMS features multiple cars in different categories all racing on track at the same time.
Photo by Aaron Kupferman - Motorsportlens.com
With only nine minutes and 20 seconds left in the endurance race, Patrick Long, driving the Flying Lizard Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, overtook the factory BMW M3 on the re-start after a late yellow flag to score a three-tenths of a second GT class win – the team’s second-straight victory.
Long, and co-driver and fellow Porsche factory pilot Joerg Bergmeister (Germany), overcame an eighth-place grid position after a troublesome qualifying session to gain the season points advantage over their rivals. The pair won five races in a row last year on the way to the GT class championship.
Referring to his battles with the Ferraris, then theCorvettes, and finally the BMWs in the closing 60 minutes of the race, the usually calm and articulate Long was almost speechless.
“I can’t even describe the last hour of this race. I was on everyone’s bumper, and they were on mine. We were fast enough to compete, but would have not been fast enough to win if the Flying Lizard crew didn’t put us in that position by minimizing our time in the pits and calling perfect strategy. The Porsche 911 GT3 RSR was perfect, and Joerg and I kept the mistakes to a minimum. I’ve never been in a race that was a pressure-cooker from green flag to checkered flag like this one,” said Long.
Photo by Sevan Pulurian
The final standings in GT showed Porsche, BMW, Corvette, Ferrari, Corvette, Porsche, BMW and then Ferrari. Porsche now leads the manufacturers’ championship points with 65, while Ferrari has 55 and BMW 50. In the drivers’ points chase, Bergmeister/Long enjoy a ten-point lead over the Ferrari drivers Melo/Bruni, while BMW drivers Mueller/Hand are third.
Seventh in GT was the Team Falken Tire Porsche 911 G3 RSR of Wolf Henzler and Bryan Sellers. The team had been fighting the setup for the twisty 2.238-mile Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca track ever since the car came off the truck, and, according to Henzler, despite the team’s hard work, they never really found that sweet spot during the six-hour event.
The other Porsche in the GT field, the Flying Lizard Motorsports entry with Seth Neiman/Darren Law/Timo Bernhard was forced into the pits twice during the event to fix damage from on-track incidents, and finished 11th in class.
Photo by Aaron Kupferman - Motorsportlens.com
While this exciting battle was raging in the GT class, a smaller, but just as intriguing competition was taking place for the overall race win. The Muscle Milk Porsche RS Spyder, with Klaus Graf/Sascha Maassen/Memo Gidley aboard, led the race overall at several junctions, and looked like they would compete for the overall win when bad luck struck.
Memo Gidley, the last-minute substitution of car owner Greg Pickett, spun the car during his first lap out in the middle of the race, going through the gravel trap. A small piece of gravel had lodged itself behind the shift paddle, causing the car to stay stuck in gear. Once the American was towed back to pit lane, the crew immediately assessed the problem, but had unfortunately fallen seven laps down to the leaders, and to 18th place overall.
But Maassen and Graf peddled hard through the field, aided by attrition at the top of the standings, and earned a second place finish overall.
In the ALMS GT Challenge class for matched Porsche 911 GT3 Cup cars, Black Swan Racing, in only their second race with their new 2010 race car, went flag-to-flag with Tim Pappas, and Dutch brothers Jeroen and Sebastiaan Bleekemolen to score an impressive win over some serious competition.
Continue to ALMS 2010 – Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca – Part 2
Awesome shots! Love this track in GT