Porsche North America took advantage of the high-speed layout of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway road course to capture a podium finish in the Brickyard Grand Prix today. The No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR finished in third-place in the highly competitive GT Le Mans class of the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship. The team used all of its assets, including several early caution periods and expert pit work, to earn the its highest finish since winning the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring in March.
The long, high-speed straightaways which have become so ingrained in the consciousness of the public through the Indianapolis 500, proved an equally good match to the Porsche 911 RSR. With an aerodynamic setup developed for the faster tracks of the World Endurance Championship, which leaves the cars at a disadvantage on racecourses requiring high downforce – such as the most recent rounds of Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca, Watkins Glen International and Canadian Tire Motorsports Park – The Brickyard’s mixture of oval and infield road course provided the Porsche a respite under its current aero setup. All three of the Porsche 911 RSRs entered in the race took full advantage of this, challenging for top-five positions during the race.
The No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR shared by American Patrick Long (Playa del Rey, California) and Michael Christensen (Denmark) maximized the potential of the car finishing third behind the race-winning No. 93 Dodge Viper SRT. The team played its pit strategy to precision using early race caution periods to move the production car-based racer into striking distance of second-place late in the event.
Patrick said, “The last few races have been ones to forget and this is the best way to do that. I’ve had wins that didn’t feel this good. It is a short celebration and then heads down for Road America. The team showed tremendous persistence and they had great pit stops. We executed today. We made no mistakes and that is reminiscent of Sebring which was the last time we were up on the podium. I hope we build off of this.”