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Super Sebring – New Golden Era

The start of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring. [Jack Webster Photo]

The start of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring. [Jack Webster Photo]

By Jack Webster & Eddie LePine

For once, all the hype about an event wasn’t just wishful thinking. Super Sebring, the combined race event showcasing the FIA-WEC and the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship was everything it was supposed to be and more. Ushering in what is likely to be a new golden era of sports car racing worldwide, starting with the FIA WEC 1000-mile race on Friday and concluding with the 71st Annual Mobile 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring on Saturday, sports car racing fans couldn’t have asked for more action, excitement, outstanding cars and unexpected endings.

Unlike last year’s iffy weather (which resulted in a shortened WEC race due to storms and lightning), this year the weather was just about perfect all week. Not too hot, not to cool, not a drop of rain after a couple of light showers on Wednesday. A combination of a great weather forecast, the GTP debut in the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring and the exotic cars of the WEC (in particular the new Ferrari), it is no wonder that Sebring this year attracted sell out crowds. We know, as we were in the thick of things all week – it was truly crowded everywhere you went. Also, a record of well over 350 credentialled journalists from around the world were on hand to cover the week’s festivities – trackside and media center spots were filled to capacity. Hats off to John Story of Sebring International Raceway and his capable crew, who did an outstanding job of organizing things for the assembled large group of media. We are sure at times it must have felt like ‘herding cats’, so to speak. Amazing job.

The combined event marked the US debut of several new cars from the WEC series. First and foremost were the pair of beautiful Ferrari 499Ps, entered in the Hypercar class by the Ferrari factory. They were instantly a fan favorite, sporting their traditional Ferrari red color scheme. Also debuting in the WEC race were a pair of Penske Porsches, the new 963 model, which made their IMSA debut at Daytona and the Rolex 24 in the GTP class. In WEC, they race in the Hypercar class. Along with entries in the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours, Porsche was well represented in the prototype ranks with a total of 4 Porsche 963s on the grid (two in WEC and two in IMSA). Cadillac, which also debuted their V-Series.R at Daytona, also had one car entered in the WEC race, to go along with two entries in the 12 Hours. Fan favorite James Glickenhaus brought along his Glickenhaus 007 to compete in the Hypercar class with stellar drivers Romain Dumas, Ryan Briscoe and Oliver Pla to share the driving duties. Of course, World Champion Toyota Gazoo Racing was returning with a pair of Toyota GR010 – Hybrid prototypes. New to American audiences were a pair of Peugeot 9X8 Hypercars, which featured a very interesting wingless design and were quite unique. Also new was the Vanwall Vandervell 680, which listed former Formula One World Driving Champion Jacques Villeneuve as one of its pilots.

In the IMSA contest, it was going to be a rematch of the GTP entries from the Rolex 24 at Daytona, where the Meyer Shank Acura took the overall win over the Konica Minolta Acura – with quite a bit of controversy after the race as we all came to find out. Acura reported to IMSA that the MSR squad had manipulated tire pressure data and although they were allowed to keep the win (and the drivers their watches), the MSR team was heavily penalized, a team member suspended from IMSA and all points forfeited. Needless to say, things were very tense in the Acura camp, with the MSR outfit keeping a low profile and Wayne Taylor expressing his displeasure at the entire affair whenever he had the chance. It is safe to say that we haven’t heard the last of the Daytona ‘tire pressure-gate’ story, and it may have major ramifications for Acura Motorsport and their chosen teams going forward.

On to the races. On Friday it was the FIA-WEC race, a 1000 mile (8 hour) endurance contest featuring the Hypercars. The new #50 Ferrari 499P started on pole and led the first 8 laps of the race before giving way to the #8 Toyota GR010. The second Ferrari (#50) led briefly, but after lap 36 it was an all Toyota show as the #7 piloted by Mike Conway, Kamui Kobayashi and Jose Lopez traded the lead back and forth with their #8 teammates Sebastien Buemi, Brendon Hartley and Ryo Hirakawa for the rest of the race. At the finish, it was the #7 Toyota taking a 2.168 second win from their teammates. The #50 pole sitting Ferrari finished third, which was an outstanding debut for the brand new car.

In all, 36 cars in the three WEC classes (Hypercar, LMP2 and LMGTE Am) took the green flag, while a very healthy 31 cars were classified at the finish. Of note, the Hertz Team Jota won the LMP2 class (they are taking delivery of the new Porsche 963 shortly), and in LMGTE Am, Corvette Racing took the top spot in the C8.R with drivers Nicolas Varrone, Nicky Catsburg and our personal favorite privateer driver Ironman Ben Keating in his first race for Corvette. Outstanding job!

Team Principal and driver of the #7 Toyota, Kamui Kobayashi stated “It is a fantastic feeling to win this race and I would like to thank everyone for their big support, particularly everyone back in Japan, including Toyoda-San and President Sato-San. The Toyota Gazoo Racing family has worked really hard to be ready for this season. We had a tough time yesterday, but we came back strongly and in the race we showed our philosophy to be one team, with everyone working very hard together. A one-two was the best result we could hope for, but this is just the start of a big fight this season. We deserved to win but we do not under-estimate the other manufacturers; today our experience helped us but we will face a big challenge this season, so we have to get stronger and fight even harder. This championship is getting really exciting and I am happy to be part of it.”

On Saturday, the field for the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring took the green flag at precisely 10:11am and as if to set the tone for the day and the drama that was to conclude the race, the #33 Sean Creech Motorsport Ligier LMP3 car spun (or was spun) in Turn 1 on the very first lap of the race, bringing out the first of what would be many full course cautions during the day and night of racing. Fittingly, eventual overall winner Pipo Derani in the Whelen Engineering Cadillac led that first chaotic lap, as his teammate Jack Aitken would later lead the last.

Start of the WEC 1000 Mile race. [Jack Webster Photo]Start of the WEC 1000 Mile race. [Jack Webster Photo]
The WEC winning Toyota makes a pit stop for full service. [Jack Webster Photo]The WEC winning Toyota makes a pit stop for full service. [Jack Webster Photo]
WEC pole winning Ferrari 499P. [Jack Webster Photo]WEC pole winning Ferrari 499P. [Jack Webster Photo]
WEWC LMGTE AM winning Corvette. [Jack Webster Photo]WEWC LMGTE AM winning Corvette. [Jack Webster Photo]
WEC LMP2 winning Oreca. [Jack Webster Photo]WEC LMP2 winning Oreca. [Jack Webster Photo]

The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Series once again had a very strong and quality entry list for Sebring, with a total of 54 cars entered for the twelve hour endurance race on the historic 17 turn, 3.74 mile Sebring airport circuit. Eight of the new GTP cars, eight LMP2 entries, ten LMP3 cars, eight GTD Pro and twenty GTD cars made up the field. There was going to be a lot of traffic throughout the race, and unfortunately, the mix of cars of various speeds made for quite a few incidents and far too many full course cautions. In total there were just a little over three hours and fifty minutes of full course yellow during the race. Hopefully, this is something that IMSA can take a look at in the future with the goal of reducing the amount of yellow caution periods. As always, ‘yellows breed yellows’ and with this many cars bunched up at the restarts, more full course cautions were the result.

For the overall win, it was a close battle all day among Acura, Cadillac, BMW, Porsche with all of them leading at one time or another. It was looking like it might be a close finish between the #6 Porsche piloted by Mathieu Jaminet and Filipe Albuquerque in the Konica Minolta Acura until Albuquerque, Jaminet and Nasr (in the #7 Porsche) all got together in Turn 3 at 9:52pm – with just 19 minutes left in the race. Albuquerque was on the inside line in Turn 1, was bumped and went into the dirt, as he flew through the dirt he came back on the track at the exit of Turn 3 and went right into the two Porsches. Several other cars were collected in the ensuing melee. But most were able to continue.

The start of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring. [Jack Webster Photo]The start of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring. [Jack Webster Photo]
Overall winning Cadillac followed by second place BMW GTP. [Jack Webster Photo]Overall winning Cadillac followed by second place BMW GTP. [Jack Webster Photo]
LMP2 winning Oreca. [Jack Webster Photo]LMP2 winning Oreca. [Jack Webster Photo]
LMP3 winning Ligier. [Jack Webster Photo]LMP3 winning Ligier. [Jack Webster Photo]
GTD Pro winning Pfaff Porsche. [Jack Webster Photo]GTD Pro winning Pfaff Porsche. [Jack Webster Photo]
GTD winning BMW M4 GT3. [Jack Webster Photo]GTD winning BMW M4 GT3. [Jack Webster Photo]
Third overall Porsche 963. [Jack Webster Photo]Third overall Porsche 963. [Jack Webster Photo]
Second place finisher in LMP2. [Jack Webster Photo]Second place finisher in LMP2. [Jack Webster Photo]

After the short yellow flag period to remove the damaged Acura and #7 Porsche, Jack Aitken in the #31 Whelen Cadillac took the lead, with Nick Yelloly in the BMW M Hybrid V8 right behind. At the finish, it was the Cadillac ending the day where they started off – in the lead. The Whelen Cadillac which was shared by Pipo Derani, Jack Aitken and Alexander Sims finished 2.229 seconds ahead of the BMW driven by Yelloly and co-drivers Connor De Phillippi and Sheldon van der Linde. Porsche Penske claimed third place, with the aforementioned Jaminet sharing the podium with co-drivers Nick Tandy and Dane Cameron.

Pipo on his 4th win: “Number four, number four! That’s endurance racing. You have to be there at the end. I’ve had so many unlucky ones since my last victory here. So I’ll take a little bit of luck. I’m sorry for the guys who crashed. They did an amazing race as well. You gotta be lucky a little bit in motorsports but we did a fantastic race. We started on pole. We had a flawless race after the incident in the beginning. We recovered well. Just fantastic to be here. Number four. It’s thanks to God. It’s for my little one at home who’s too little to see it but special for sure.”

In LMP2, the #8 ORECA 07 Gibson of Tower Motorsports piloted by John Farano, Scott McLaughlin and Kyffin Simpson had a fine victory, coming back from a mid-race crash that required outstanding pit work, to win by just a little more than one second over the #11 TDS Racing ORECA.

In LMP3, The Riley Ligier had a successful day, taking a one lap victory in the class. Gar Robinson, who now has 10 IMSA victories, shared driving duties on the winning car with Felipe Fraga and Josh Burdon: “This is the most brutal race in the world. Being from Texas I think I’m used to the heat, but Florida heat is a totally different game. I’m so proud of the guys making everything go like it did today. We all pushed really hard.”

In GTD-PRO, The Plaid guys won, with Pfaff Motorsports taking the win in their Porsche 911 GT3R. Drivers Patrick Pilet, Klaus Bachjler and Laurens Vanthoor shared the driving duties. It looks like that BOP adjustment from IMSA gave them some of the help they needed to get to the top step of the podium, but certainly not all. Incredible fuel savings and being able to drive a last stint of over one hour and fifty minutes saved the day. Patrick Pilet: “During our race we got the right strategy and at the end we have the gamble saving fuels. As they call me, the expert for saving fuel, so I did my job. Thanks to Porsche for giving me the opportunity to work with these guys.”

In GTD, it was a BMW 1-2 finish, with the Paul Miller Racing BMW M4 GT3 (Bryan Sellers, Madison Snow, Corey Lewis) taking the win by just under one second from the Turner Motorsports BMW (Robby Foley, Patrick Gallagher, Michael DInan). Madison Snow on saving fuel at the end: “I’d say it was up to the drivers and the crew for the first 10 hours, and then it was up to the engineer for the last 2 hours, hour and a half to go. Yes. Lars (Giersing) was the one who had this strategy and got us home. It’s huge. I mean it’s been a while since I’ve been on the podium. But to do it with Brian and Corey, it feels great.”

It was an historic race weekend for the ages, and one that is likely not to be repeated, as it looks like the FIA-WEC group will no longer be participating in the Super Sebring in the future. One can only hope that perhaps they will return to this historic circuit that the drivers and fans love and once again ‘respect the bumps’ that are part of Sebring’s DNA.

In the meantime, IMSA is alive and very well, thank you. We are looking forward to a full season of incredible racing action throughout the upcoming year. GTP is here to stay, and looks to get better and better as time goes by. Keep those new GTP entries coming!

From Sebring, and the second longest race of the year, it is on to Long Beach and the shortest race of the season, and on a street circuit on top of that. That is the appeal of IMSA racing – never ending challenges.

See you at the races.

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