Road Atlanta: BAM! practice two report

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BAM! (British American Motorsport) set the fourth-fastest GT time during Thursday afternoon practice for the Petit Le Mans, with anticipation of a valuable night practice session ahead. Adam Jones lapped the 2.54-mile Road Atlanta road course in one minute 24.249 seconds in the No. 43 YES Network Porsche 911 GT3 RSR that he is driving with Leo Hindery, Jr. and Lucas Luhr. The Petit Le Mans is Jones' first race in North America.

"I managed to string one [clear] lap together, and I was quite pleased. There's so much traffic out there! When you try to find some clear track, you go around the corner and the yellow flags will be out, there will be somebody facing the wrong way in front of you, there's gravel on the circuit, there's grass, there's cars everywhere. It's just like trying to park your car in a big car parking in a shopping mall - everybody's going for the last space," he noted.

"The temperature was higher this afternoon than it has been any other afternoon that we've been out there. I was expecting the grip level to be very poor, but it surprised me; the grip level was really, really good. The setup that we have now is definitely the best one we've had so far."

fast lane

Lucas Luhr recently rode his Porsche-powered Harley V-Rod from Monaco to Koblenz, Germany - a distance of 1200 kilometers - in 12 hours, then jumped in his race car the next morning for a test on the Nürburgring Nordschleife circuit. The two-cylinder motorcyle was developed by Porsche and Harley-Davidson. Just as teams work on their race cars during the off-season, Luhr fine-tunes his bike for the new season.

"I had to take my bike to Germany because I had some modifications, some custom-made wheels, to add," he said. "It's nice, it's a good toy. A lot of my friends have this, so we go out and ride together from Monaco down to Corsica or wherever. Right now, the weather in Monaco isn't nice enough to go on long trips, so I decided to leave it in Germany over the winter and do some modifications, and then it will be good to go for the new season."

charity support

BAM! is supporting Corvette driver Johnny O'Connell's annual charity auction with a special contribution. All of the BAM! drivers and team members signed one of the team's signature Yankees pinstripe crew shirts for the auction. Lucas Luhr also donated a pair of his driver gloves and a personalized Nomex shirt, both signed. The auction will start at 6 pm Friday in the winners' circle at Road Atlanta.

-bam-