Sears Point: SAMAX qualifying report

SAMAX/ Doncaster Racing will start the Rolex Sports Car Series race at Infineon Raceway from 12th on the GT grid. Greg Wilkins qualified the No. 17 SAMAX/ Doncaster Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car that he shares with Dave Lacey, lapping the 2.52-mile road course in Sonoma, Calif., in one minute 41.481 seconds. Wilkins will drive the first race stint on Saturday, followed by Lacey.

"The time was okay, but the result was a bit disappointing," Wilkins said. "But it was my fastest time of the weekend and a second and a half faster than the previous session, so that's progress. The car was great; the guys did a good job putting the car together. We developed a couple of new issues just 'cause we were going a bit faster, which we can work on tomorrow. That is typical of most of our qualifyings and races -- we can pretty much race at our qualifying pace, and I'm not sure that that's what the other competitors can do."

Wilkins hasn't raced the challenging Sonoma, Calif., track for 10 years, but he quickly identified the requirements for speed: "It takes some seat time and courage ... maybe in the opposite order. It's a fantastic track!"

spotter support

Lacey and Wilkins get a boost from SAMAX Motorsport owner Peter Baron and Doncaster Racing timing/scoring analyst Julie Denton, who watch practice sessions and report from different turns on the track. Lacey noted their input translates into faster lap times.

"It's great having our spotters around the track because they definitely help out," he said. "Where you think you are on the race track and where you actually are can be two different things, so having a birds'-eye view -- especially at this track -- is absolutely terrific. They can look at competitors and who's quick through the turns. They run split times on the different cars, look at their lines and correlate that, then feed it back to us. It really helps out."

-credit: samax