In the first six races of the 2012 Grand-Am Rolex Series season, the No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro has placed in the top 10 every time and they have enjoyed the view from the podium in each of the last four races. At the Emco Gears Classic at Mid-Ohio this weekend, Robin Liddell and John Edwards drove a solid race, starting from the pole position, and came home in third place, finishing less than a second behind a Ferrari. Liddell* has now collected 174 points in the Driver’s Championship, just 11 points behind the AIM Autosport FXDD Ferrari pilots Jeff Segal and Emil Assentato.
(*Liddell’s season-long co-driver Edwards had to miss several races due to injuries suffered in a skiing accident. Ronnie Bremer filled in during Edward’s absence.)
The Stevenson Team is also in second place in the GT Team Championship as the series begins to take the show up to Wisconsin for the Road America race in two weeks, the seventh event in the thirteen race season.
Liddell: “It was another great run for the Stevenson Camaro netting our fourth podium in a row. The team and the guys have been doing an amazing job this year and this continued again throughout the weekend with a flawlessly prepared car and excellent pit work. We expected the race to be hard work as the temperatures were at a weekend high for the race on Saturday and the front runners were all pretty close on lap times. John did a great job again putting the car on pole and leading the race early on whilst saving fuel, which helped to open up the pit window and give us more options with the race strategy later on.”
Strategy was applied early as the Chevrolet Camaro carries a 16.5 gallon capacity gas tank allowing the team to run about 50 minutes per fuel load. With a 2 hour 45 minute race, the team basically started 15 minutes short on fuel and hoped they could make just two stops. During his stint, Edwards did get a yellow and that allowed him to stretch his run on the first tank of gas to the point where a two stop strategy could work.
Johnson agreed saying: “John started from pole and ran comfortably up front for an hour, stretching the fuel window to put us on a two stop strategy which is just what we needed.”
Then again, when the competition has an edge in performance, even the best strategy can have little impact on the outcome.
Johnson: “Robin was able to continue what John started, but we could see when Bill Auberlen (BMW) and Jeff Segal (Ferrari) got into their cars, that it would only be a matter of time before they caught us. Bill got us pretty easily, but Robin held off the No. 69 Ferrari until the last pit stop, and since Grand-Am feels that the fastest car should also have the most fuel and fastest fuel delivery, we lost to them in the pits. Robin then did a super job holding off the No. 70 Mazda for the last 50 minutes giving us our fourth podium in a row. “
Liddell: “Once the first round of stops had taken place and the drivers cycled through it was clear that the BMW and Ferrari had the kind of pace which we would struggle to match. From there we had to make sure we could finish the race on just the one stop and with a late caution keep our noses clean and stay ahead of the No. 70 Mazda. That car was quick down the back straight but we could close the gap around the rest of the track.”
“It was a good points scoring weekend, Liddell continued, “but with nothing to touch the Ferrari they will quickly run away with the championship if they are not brought back in line with the rest of the GT field.”
John Edwards came away from the weekend with a sense of more good to come for this team.
“It was another podium and another race flawlessly executed by the Stevenson Team.” Edwards commented. “Once again the crew delivered excellent pit stops and we had good track position going into each of those stops. Unfortunately, a mistake-free race only put us P3 at the end since the No. 94 BMW and No. 69 Ferrari had a little better pace over a full stint. However, the team’s consistency has put us second in the championship and we are headed to some tracks where the Camaro has been quick in the past. Hopefully everything can come together to get the No. 57 Camaro back to the top of the podium. “
Source : Stevenson Motorsports