Patrick Long and the #58 Wright Motorsports Racing crew had a competitive weekend at Mid-Ohio as the Pirelli World Challenge raced rounds 6 and 7 of the GT Sprint championship, claiming P5 in Saturday’s race and pole for Sunday’s feature. Starting from pole in round 7, Patrick led the field away but lost the lead to eventual winner Alvaro Parente, who himself had claimed a dominant win on Saturday. Patrick went on to finish second, though his championship lead was slimmed. Unofficially, Long heads Parente by five points, 157-152, in the PWC GT Sprint standings.
Patrick said, “Alvaro and his team have been on it all weekend so credit goes to them. They’re very good on the long run and the first couple of laps building pressure. With that, Alvaro had a great run coming out of the carousel and it didn’t bode well for me to drive him to the wall since we have a mutual respect. Again, he was the car to beat this weekend. Last year it was tough for us to break into the top 10.
“It’s a special race for Wright Motorsports since it’s a home event so for them to get us on the podium, it still feels pretty good. Usually second sucks but today we’ll take it. The competition in PWC since I first sampled this series back in 2006 has just gone upward. I think the competition level is high when you have factory drivers from GM, McLaren, and Porsche so it’s a pretty proud moment for me.”
The Pirelli World Challenge next heads to Utah Motorsports Campus on Aug. 11-13.
