Patrick Long and his teammate Michael Christensen had a solid race on the streets of Long Beach, finishing 5th in the GT Le Mans class. Long and Christensen have established themselves solidly into 3rd in the driver’s championship, while Porsche retained its lead in the manufacturer’s championship, with three of 12 races for the 2014 season in the books.
The race hinged on a single pit stop with approximately one hour remaining in the 100-minute race, by far the shortest race of the season. First, the No. 911 stopped and Richard Lietz relinquished the car to Nick Tandy with fresh Michelin tires and a full fuel load from their fifth place qualifying position. One lap later, the No. 912 stopped with Patrick Long taking over from Michael Christensen who was running sixth at the time. After the rotation, the No. 911 gained one spot moving to fourth while the No. 912 did the same, moving to fifth. From the sole pit stop to the conclusion of the third round of the championship, Nick Tandy ran a mostly unchallenged race to cross under the checkered flag 27 seconds behind the winners.
Long said, “I am happy we persevered with a lot of challenges today. Fourth and fifth are not first and second but it’s a long season so we need to put points on the board. I didn’t have a radio for the whole stint so I didn’t know if the BMW was on the lead lap. I just pushed as hard as I could at the end. It was a good hard, clean fight with Bill Auberlen. Michael did a really solid job and we just made the best of what we had this weekend.“