Porsche makes the podium at Brickyard Grand Prix

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 on Friday. 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 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 Sports Car World Endurance Championship WEC, 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.

Long and Christensen take third

The No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR shared by American Patrick Long and Michael Christensen (Denmark) maximized the potential of the car finishing third. 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.

The race was the most bittersweet for the No. 911 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR. The entry driven by Richard Lietz (Austria) and Nick Tandy (Great Britain) suffered an engine failure when in the lead of the GTLM class. Tandy had two strong restarts to move from sixth to second, and then into the lead early in the second hour of the race. However, telemetry recognized an engine issue and the team retired the car with 55 minutes remaining in the twohour, 45-minute race.

The Team Falken Tire Porsche 911 RSR of Wolf Henzler (Germany) and Bryan Sellers (USA) ran well before an extended stop to make repairs. After running in the top-five, the only customer team in North America to race Porsche’s most advanced 911 finished ninth.

Porsche