Porsche aims to repeat last year’s historic win at Lime Rock Park

July 17, 2018 Tim Havermans 911 GT3 R, 911 RSR, Earl Bamber, imsa, Laurens Vanthoor, Nick Tandy, Patrick Long, Patrick Pilet

The schedule
The race takes off on Saturday, 21 July, at 15.10 hrs local time (21.10 hrs CEST) and runs over 2:40 hours. The race can be viewed live outside the USA and Canada on www.imsa.com.

Comments before the race
Dr Frank-Steffen Walliser, Vice President Motorsport and GT Cars: “We celebrated our maiden win with the new 911 RSR at Lime Rock last year. We’re keen to repeat this success. After the strong performances at Watkins Glen and Bowmanville, we’re now heading to Lime Rock fully prepared and feeling very optimistic. We’ll do our utmost to secure a top result and further improve our promising position in the fight for the championship.”

Pascal Zurlinden, Director GT Factory Motorsport: “Overtaking is difficult at Lime Rock, hence it’s important to start from as far up the grid as possible. A good qualifying result is half the battle on this narrow circuit – as we saw last year with our win.”

Sebastian Golz, Project Manager GT Customer Sport: “It’s important on such a short and twisty track to carefully maintain the grip level of the tyre. If you’re too tough on them there is no time to recover – and then things get difficult.”

Patrick Pilet (911 RSR #911): “I’m expecting a gripping race at Lime Rock. The course is narrow and twisty and it sometimes reminds me of a go-kart track. The cars are often bunched close together, which makes it interesting for the fans. We did very well last year with our 911 RSR and I have no reason to think we can’t do it again this year.”

Nick Tandy (911 RSR #911): “Lime Rock is great turf for Porsche. We’ve always performed very well on this racetrack. We look forward to this unique race all year. Because the track is so short the traffic is always heavy. Our team has to implement the right race strategy so that we get as many free runs as possible.”

Porsche 911 GT3 R (58), Wright Motorsports Patrick Long, Christina Nielsen

Laurens Vanthoor (911 RSR #912): “Our double victory last year underlined that the racetrack suits us. However, Lime Rock is no easy race. The laps are very short and you have to be extremely careful to manoeuvre through the heavy traffic unscathed. Lime Rock marks the start of the critical phase of the championship. That makes it all the more important to earn decent points.”

Earl Bamber (911 RSR #912): “Lime Rock is a great track for Porsche. We have always performed well there in recent years. The entire team is excited to tackle this race. The fact that we claimed overall victory with the 911 RSR at Lime Rock last year gives us additional motivation.”

Patrick Long (911 GT3 R #58): “Lime Rock is constant cornering, there’s very little chance to relax. The racetrack offers everything that makes racing fun – it has very fast corners and some slow bends, where we can use the good traction of our 911 GT3 R.”