Q: HOW MUCH ARE YOU LOOKING FORWARD TO LAGUNA?
A: “Laguna has a special place in my heart. It was the place I won ever my first two sports car races in my career, back in the Skip Barber MAZDASPEED Pro Challenge. It started off really great for me and I have always enjoyed going there. We’ve had some really good runs in the past and have been quite competitive there. We haven’t been able to put together any wins there since, but going to Laguna this year with Pierre Ehret and Flying Lizard Motorports, I have the best chance to come out with a really good result there, especially in a four-hour race. It’s still a sprint race and you’re still pushing flat-out all the time. But it puts more emphasis than usual on making sure you have a strong co-driver and a strong team behind you. Those two I definitely have! Pierre did a great job at Sebring for Flying Lizard Motorsports and knows Laguna quite well. Also with Flying Lizard, the strategy was perfect at Long Beach. The team worked great, the strategy was flawless, and the guys gave us very quick pit stops.
“It’s going to be an extremely challenging weekend, especially racing into the dusk. There’s a major challenge with the sun setting getting in the drivers’ eyes, and there’s also plenty of dust right off the track that always finds itself all over the driving line. The grip levels are going to change quite dramatically through the race so it’s going to be important to have a car and drivers that can adapt through the race and to make sure you’re always finding the ultimate grip levels.”
Q: HOW WAS IT WORKING WITH FLYING LIZARD AT LONG BEACH?
A: “It’s funny. As a driver, or I guess anybody in life, you’re always apprehensive about starting a new relationship. But I was really excited to get there and get to know everyone. Right away, it was incredibly obvious how professional they were right out of the gate. They know how to get it done. They know what a professional driver wants and needs to go out there and perform at his best. The team provides all of that. They have everything fantastically laid out. All of the guys are great and easy to get along with. Very noticeable is the really solid core culture within the team. Everyone knows their jobs and they all perform to the best of their abilities. I’ve got to say, the radio work, which helped me through traffic, was the biggest reason I was able to hold off Jeroen Bleekemolen at the end. Eric Ingraham, the team manager and who is on the radio with me, was calling traffic. They deliver those little things that are so important to get any advantage we can get. We’ve got a really good team behind us.”
Q: HOW REWARDING WAS IT TO GET A PODIUM IN FIRST RACE FOR FLYING LIZARD
A: “After qualifying, we were a little bit disappointed. We just didn’t get the ultimate pace we wanted out of the car. Going into the race, we made more changes and didn’t know what to expect. But Brian Wong had a really strong start and was able to give me the car in second place, moving up from seventh on the grid. And with a track that’s so difficult to overtake, I knew that we would have a very strong chance of keeping people behind us. But we didn’t have to block or fight because we actually had the pace to belong in the top-three cars, which was very nice and promising for us moving forward for the rest of the season. One of the big positives from the weekend was that we had a very good initial result with third but we also have some very clear steps of how and where we can improve even further. That’s always exciting. It was nice to finish third and be on the podium; it was a very special thing with our first race with the team. But with having a clear path, I’m excited to see where the gains will be going into Laguna.”
Q: WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE PART OF LAGUNA AND WHAT IS THE MOST CHALLENGING PART?
A: “Everyone talks about the corkscrew, which is definitely the most picturesque and interesting to look at. But once you go through it a few times, it ends up being kinda like a slow hairpin where you feel like you drop off the edge of the world. For most drivers, that corner isn’t the highlight of the track. I really like Turn 9, which is a downhill left-hander. Then Turn 10, which is a downhill right-hander. Both are back-to-back and very high speed and require a lot of decisions. It’s really tricky for a driver, especially being a low-grip track. Working traffic is always difficult through there as everyone wants to be on that one line. Especially, in the final few hour of the race, not only will you be fighting with people in GTC, you’re also going to be fighting with the other classes out there to make sure you’re on the line you want to be on, and not them. Turns 6 leading onto the back straightaway and Turns 9 and 10 are the highlight corners as a driver at Laguna Seca.”
Q: WERE YOU SURPRISED BY THE LEVEL OF COMPETITION IN GTC?
A: “Over the last few years, it’s been getting better and better and better. When I saw the list of names at Sebring and the people who would be doing the season, we all knew it was going to be a battle straight from the start. Every driver on that list has so many accomplishments. They’ve won races and championships. There’s no weak links at all. Every single car has someone strong in it. Every weekend, everyone is going to be so close and tight with all the cars being relatively the same. All of the teams are also extremely strong.”
“The ALMS GT class was always the dominant one with the most talent and the best racing. But I think GTC is giving a very strong run for its money to be the most competitive class this year. From Alex Job Racing with Jeroen Bleekemolen to JDX Racing with Jan Heylen, TRG cars with Stanton and Faulkner and our sister car with Pumpelly. There are just so many cars and drivers that it’s every little minute detail is so important, in order to get any kind of little advantage. As a driver and as a team, that’s what we’re really focusing on. It’s almost got an open-wheel feel to it because those are the teams that are battling for those last hundredths of a second. And that’s what we’re doing right now. A half-tenth at some places will make you go from sixth place to second to third or even first, it’s going to be that close all year long.”
Source : Dion von Moltke