At the wheel of his Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, Porsche works driver Richard Lietz secured an excellent grid position for the Sebring 12 hour race. In qualifying for the oldest sports car race in the USA, which kicks off this year’s American Le Mans Series on Saturday, Lietz posted the quickest time in the newly-created GTE-AM sports car class in the 911 GT3 RSR fielded by Proton Competition. In this class, the regulations permit one professional race driver only per vehicle. His teammates are Christian Ried (Germany) and Italy’s Gianluca Roda. Gallery after the jump
“In the lap where my tyres had the best grip I didn’t get a free run, otherwise I could have been another tenth of a second faster,” said Richard Lietz. “But still, our team is totally happy with the best time in the GTE-AM class at our first outing in Sebring.”
In the GT class, Porsche factory pilot Joerg Bergmeister (Germany) was the fastest Porsche driver. In the cockpit of Flying Lizard Motorsports’ 911 GT3 RSR, the title defender posted the sixth fastest time on Friday. Bergmeister shares driving duties with his works driver colleagues Patrick Long (USA) and Marc Lieb (Germany). American Bryan Sellers, who teams up with Porsche works driver Wolf Henzler (Germany), takes up the race from position twelve with the Porsche 911 GT3 RSR of Team Falken.
“Over the last few days we concentrated on finding a good race set-up,” Joerg Bergmeister said. “For the qualifying we tried out a couple of changes, but they didn’t work. I’m obviously not entirely pleased about sixth on the grid, but it’s more important to have a consistently fast car at a twelve hour race than a good grid position.”
Qualifying result
GT class
1. Gianmaria Bruni (I), Ferrari F430, 2:01.561 minutes
2. Oliver Gavin (GB), Chevrolet Corvette, + 0.182 seconds
3. Dirk Werner (D), BMW M3 GT, + 0.280
4. Dirk Müller (D), BMW M3 GT, + 0.578
5. Jaime Melo (BRA), Ferrari F458, + 0.729
6. Jörg Bergmeister (D), Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, + 0.773
12. Bryan Sellers (USA), Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, + 1.443
GTE-AM class
1. Richard Lietz (A), Porsche 911 GT3 RSR, 2:02.942 minutes
GTC class
1. Leh Keen (USA), Porsche 911 GT3 Cup, 2:07.373 minutes
