A jubilant Krohn Racing team proudly celebrated the pole position for tomorrow’s 63rd Annual 12 Hours of Sebring, after Frenchman Olivier Pla set a new qualifying track record Friday afternoon at Sebring International Raceway. He piloted the popular green-and-blue No. 57 Krohn Racing Ligier JSP2 Judd to a time of 1:51.152 and a speed of 121.131mph.
Pla, the developmental driver of the Ligier JS P2, built by Onroak Automotive, dominated practice at Sebring all week. He led the charts in two practice sessions and never dipped below third place in timing, while assisting the Krohn team in an optimum set-up for the car.
Pla was the pole winner at Sebring in 2012 and was second on the grid last year. This is Krohn Racing’s sixth pole position since its start as a race team in 2006. Other Krohn Racing pole sitting drivers have included Nic Jonsson, Ricardo Zonta and Colin Braun. The Krohn Racing team won in class at Sebring in 2011 in the GTE-Am class of the FIA Intercontinental Le Mans Cup series.
OLIVIER PLA, Krohn Racing, Qualifyingand Pole Winning Driver:
“The pole at Sebring is a fantastic feeling. It is one of the most prestigious races in the whole world and to be on the pole for tomorrow’s race is fantastic. The team did an incredible job to give me a great car. I know tomorrow is going to be a long and difficultrace and we will push until the end and see what happens. We have to be reallyhappy with what we did and it was a perfect strategy from the team so I am veryhappy.”
What else do you need to do going into the race tomorrow?
“The strategy is not yet complete. We still need to talk and makeit. It’s not fully done yet.”
TRACY W. KROHN, Krohn Racing TeamOwner/Driver:
On Olivier Pla and Krohn Racing winning the polefor tomorrow’s race:
“You know, it’s been a long, dry spell forus. Olivier did a fantastic job today and the car has been set-up for hisliking and it shows with the way he was able to drive the car like that. Thecar looked pretty loose on the video, but that’s the way he likes it and that’sall right with me. The car’s been good all week. We spent several days testinghere at Sebring. A big appreciation goes out to Olivier and the crew forgetting the car ready and where it needs to be for tomorrow and hopefully we’llfinish the race the same way. It’s a pure exercise in patience and that’sreally what this race is all about. You have to be patient and keep the car onthe track. No mistakes and good pit stops, that’s how you win this race becauseit’s going to be hell out there.”
HAYDEN BURVILL, Krohn Racing, Engineer:
“It always feels good to getthe pole. We came here and did testing and this is the reward for all that hardwork. Oli knew he could do something like this and it’s always hard in practiceto find a gap in traffic to get the chance to work on it. Now the strategy hascompletely changed. That was the qualifying target we hit with the potential wehad, now we’ll switch back to our race program, which we also tested. The teamcame well prepared for capturing the qualifying speed and race performance isnow our goal.”