The Heart of Racing driversMario Farnbacher (Germany) and Alex Riberas (Spain) are ready for this weekend’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Michelin GT Challenge race to run at Virginia International Raceway (VIR) this weekend, August 26-28.
Farnbacher and Riberas are looking forward to putting The Heart of Racing Porsche through its paces at the 3.27-mile, 17-turn VIR circuit located northeast of Danville, Virginia. The duo are fifth in the overall season GTD driver points, but they lead the Tequila Patron North American Endurance Championship by one point. Every race weekend the young duo have been competitive, so far, grabbing four pole positions and a win on the season at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca.
“I like VIR a lot,” Farnbacher said. “It’s a very technical track where you have to be very precise. In terms of BOP (Balance of Performance) we will again have a lot of hard work to do behind the wheel as well as get a few lucky breaks. The entire track is important as far as set-up of The Heart of Racing Porsche goes. There is a mix of tight corners, with the fast esses and turns where you have to use a lot of curb. We try to make everything work the best and maximize the performance of our 911 GT3R.”
Riberas is, again, leaning an all new circuit.
“VIR looks like proper fun,” Riberas said. “I heard a lot of stories when the car gets light on the fast section and you feel like you are somehow flying. I can’t wait to experience it myself and hopefully fly in terms of lap time. I think we are going to be competitive with The Heart of Racing Porsche. Mario has always been fast at VIR and hopefully I will get up to speed quickly. The team has a lot of data and Mario and Ian (James) are always a great help with these new circuits.”
“We will have our work cut out for us this weekend,” Alex Job, team owner said. “Alex and Mario have done a great job all season working together to get Alex up to speed on all these tracks that are new to him. There are a couple of long straights at VIR where we will be a bit behind with the GT3R in top speed compared to the competition, so we will be focusing our set-up on the twisty sections.”
The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship will travel to Virginia International Raceway for the Michelin GT Challenge to run August 26-28. The race from VIR will be televised live on FOX Sports1 starting at 1:30 p.m. ET on Sunday. Follow qualifying at IMSA.tv and timing and scoring at IMSA.com.