Fresh from its best result of the season to date, second place in the hotly contested GTLM category, achieved at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Risi Competizione now heads to Road America at Elkhart Lake in Wisconsin.  The Houston-based, privately-owned Ferrari team is in a buoyant mood as it approaches its eighth round of the TUDOR United Sportscar Championship, and is looking to back up its Indy performance with another podium finish.

Road America’s 4.05 mile, European-style layout is popular with almost everyone in the field, and features a series of single corners without tricky or technical combinations, including the notorious “Kink”, with useable curbs which can help to reduce lap time.  This is a high speed track and speeds of around 160mph (260kph) are reached three times a lap.

With an expected GT lap time of around 2m06s, track time will be at a premium in the practice sessions leading up to the race so the team will be working hard to optimize their set up as quickly as possible.  Pierre Kaffer can’t wait to return to Road America and says, “It’s a fantastic track, one of the very best in North America and I hope that, now the Ferrari 458 Italia has received a better Balance of Performance, we will be able to challenge again for a podium finish.  It will for sure be very competitive again in the GTLM class…just like the last races have been.  
 
“It’s quite a difficult track to set up a car for.  It’s long and you need to have a good set up for both slow and high speed corners, bumps and kerbs as well.  We have good data from here in the past so we should have a good base from which to start.  I’m really looking forward to racing here again, and am sure that Giancarlo will really like the track.”

The next two rounds – Road America and VIR – are the final ones this season that will be new to Italian Giancarlo Fisichella.