Circuit of the Americas in Texas - WEC this Sunday Sept 1st

[teamzr1]

TF Sport and the Chevy Corvette Z06 GT3.R program come full-circle this weekend as the FIA World Endurance Championship returns to Circuit of the Americas for the first time since 2020 at the six-hour Lone Star Le Mans.
Two of the TF Sport-run Corvettes are set for Sunday’s race around the 21-turn, 3.4-mile circuit in Austin. It’s the lone visit to the U.S. for the FIA WEC and the pair of first-year GT3.Rs that are part of the LMGT3 class.

However, it isn’t the first race for the Corvettes at COTA this season, as the Corvette swept both rounds of GT World Challenge America.
Despite a difference in weather conditions in May vs. September and tires Pirelli vs. Goodyear, there are significant lessons that can carry over to the WEC round.
From an engineering perspective, suspension and other points in chassis setup, with validations from Chevrolet’s Driver in the Loop simulator, should provide a solid baseline for when TF Sport arrives at COTA and hits the track for Friday’s first practice.

The squad has previous success at COTA with a GTE-Am class win in the last FIA WEC event at the track in 2020.
Corvette factory driver Charlie Eastwood was part of the winning lineup and was part of the program’s first test with the Corvette Z06 GT3.R roughly a year ago.

Eastwood will continue in the No. 81 Corvette alongside full-season teammates Tom Van Rompuy and Rui Andrade each of which will compete at COTA for the first time. So will all three members of the No. 82 Z06 GT3.R lineup: while Hiroshi Koizumi, Sebastien Baud and factory driver Daniel Juncadella, who also tested the Corvette for the first at COTA last August.

The Lone Star Le Mans is scheduled for 1 p.m. CT on Sunday, September 1. Motor Trend TV will air live television coverage with streaming coverage on the FIA WEC app and the MAX app in the U.S. Radio Le Mans also will stream audio coverage of Saturday’s final practice and qualifying, plus Sunday’s race.

TF SPORT PRE-EVENT DRIVER QUOTES

CHARLIE EASTWOOD, NO. 81 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“In general, it’s a fantastic track. It’s undergone some repaving, so it will be interesting to see what happens with that. I have fond memories of COTA.
The last time we were there in WEC, we won the race, which was a great result. It also was the very first place I got to drive the Z06 GT3.R a year ago in the heat of the summer, which is what we’re going to have.
I think it will suit the car very well. Degradation will be a key in the middle of summer in Austin it’s not going to be cool at all so managing that from the outset will be important. I’m looking forward to it. Brazil wasn’t a great result, but we showed some strong pace, which at the minute is what we need to show. We’ve got a bit of confidence going in.

“The three sectors are three different racetracks, for sure. The first is super-high speed. You really have to have a good aero platform to get through. It’s still seven corners, but they’re almost all high-speed, so you need a good car under you.
The middle sector is super-tricky, with really long apexes and really late apexes. Then going to the final sector, you still need an excellent car under you.

There is a lot of speed, so the deg will be high. It’s a really tricky track to get it fully hooked up. It’s a super-long lap with a lot of high-speed corners with a lot of corners it’ll test both the car and the drivers. Hopefully we can put everything together for a good result.”

RUI ANDRADE, NO. 81 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“I’m very excited to race in COTA for the first time. The track is incredible and to race a Corvette in the USA is such an amazing opportunity. The season hasn’t been easy for us, but we are taking steps forward, and in Brazil we saw some good steps in performance.
I can’t wait to hit the track and give it our all to try and chase some trophies.”

DANIEL JUNCADELLA, NO. 82 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“COTA will be quite a special event for me. I’ve never raced at COTA, but I did my first test there in a Corvette GT3 last August.
So it’s cool to close out my first proper year of driving Corvettes at COTA. With it being the home, WEC race for the Corvette should be a good event. The track is cool. Watching on TV, you always think it’s not super-exciting because there is so much asphalt runoffs there. But when I drove there last year, I was quite impressed by the combination of high-speed corners, the fast changes of direction and elevation.

It’s quite interesting, and I really enjoyed it, even though I only drove maybe 20 or 25 laps. So it should be cool. It will be difficult to manage the heat, so that will play a big role in terms of strategy and how we manage the tires.
These are a couple of good ingredients to make the race quite exciting for everybody.
Hopefully we can navigate those and get our best result for the season.”

 

[teamzr1]

This weekend is a significant one for TF Sport, representing Corvette on home soil at Lone Star Le Mans in the WEC’s first race at Circuit of the Americas since 2020.
Up front in the LMGT3 class, it’s a three-way battle for the lead of the championship, with Manthey’s pair of Porsche sitting 1-2 in the standings and the No. 92 from Pure Rxcing holding a commanding 25-point lead after another win in São Paulo.

But the expectation is that this weekend’s six-hour race in the Texas sunshine will not be a walk in the park for either of the two 911s, or the title-contending No. 31 WRT BMW M4 LMGT3.
There’s a lack of circuit knowledge to content with, success ballast to factor in and tweaks to the Balance of Performance, which should see the field tighten. The COTA circuit has also been resurfaced over the summer, making the weekend’s action a challenge for everyone.

While the title battle is in full focus with the season beginning to come to a close, there are plenty of additional storylines to follow in the category.
With each passing race meeting, it’s becoming more hotly contested as the teams new to the WEC and those racing with new cars grow into the season. There’s a not-so-orderly queue of teams now desperate to score a first win before the end of the season.

One of these is TF, which has endured a challenging run through the first five races. The transition from Aston Martin to Chevrolet and the task of competing with a brand-new GT3 car was never going to be a walk in the park, but Tom Ferrier’s crew have stuck at it, balancing the team’s flagship WEC GT3 program with its European Le Mans Series and Asian Le Mans Series commitments.

“Everyone comes here happy and energized after a bit of a summer break,” Ferrier told RACER. “It’s been really hard this year. We do the same programs every year it feels like, but this time Asian Le Mans rolled straight into the additional WEC race at Qatar and the Prologue, which meant four weeks back to back, and in ELMS there was a doubleheader last year, so it’s been the same program but with more races. We’ve also done a lot more testing this year to get our heads around the Corvette.”

So far this year TF has a best finish of seventh at Imola with the No. 81 car of Tom van Rompuy, Charlie Eastwood and Rui Andrade.
But Ferrier doesn’t feel that reflects the team’s progress. Regardless, priority one for this season was simply learning the ins and outs of the new car and building its relationship with GM and Pratt Miller.

“We’re taking steps forward,” Ferrier said. “We haven’t shown that in actual results, but in Brazil, for instance, we should have been P4 had we not had a drive-through, and that would have been a good result for us. We just need a big result on the board, and we hope here is where things change. Too often we’ve had flawless runs in practice and qualifying, then had issues in the race.

“You always have high hopes, and when we started off with pole in Qatar we thought, ‘Wow!
’But we said going in, getting a podium in year one would make us happy, and we wanted to be fighting for that at the end of the year. We never thought we’d come straight in and have it easy.

“The whole torque sensor addition for the class (for BoP purposes), for instance, has been tricky and created a lot of work. We felt like we were playing catch-up early on because some factories in the class had a bit of a head start with it (through parallel Hypercar programs which have been utilizing the devices since the category’s debut).

“The virtual energy aspect has really changed the in-race strategy too, because the stints are shorter, we are doing more stops and in WEC tire allocation is limited, so you have to be careful and experiment. But we are in a good place now.”

Behind the scenes, work has been ongoing throughout the season to improve the Z06 LMGT3.R, whether that be via updates to improve the car’s software and reliability, or via shared experiences with other Corvette customer teams.

Corvette Racing has been tactical at this early stage, providing a restricted number of customer cars for a set of teams who all compete in separate championships. By not pitting customers against each other, it enables them to have an open relationship.
“We’ve been doing group Zoom calls with Pratt Miller, AWA and DXDT between races, where we share information and discuss any issues we have,” Ferrier said. “That’s been so helpful at this stage.

“It makes for a really nice product. Pratt Miller and GM do so much in the background and that’s made it very positive in year one because we have had reliability issues and blind spots. But we’ve been working through it, every weekend the car receives updates and that’s been massive.”

This is just the beginning of what TF Sport hopes will be a long-term, successful partnership with GM. Plans for an expansion of its effort with Corvette are afoot following the delivery of a third chassis in June ahead of Le Mans. This third car will not only act as a test chassis going forward, it will likely be used for race programs outside the WEC.

For starters, Ferrier hopes to use it in the Asian Le Mans Series over the winter, so he can compete for an automatic invitation to the Le Mans 24 Hours via success in the GT3 class that would guarantee a third Corvette on the grid for the biggest race of the year. Taking it to the ELMS for the first time in 2025 is also a possibility.

“It would mean more learning on the Goodyear tires and the torque sensors if we take the car to ELMS, which would boost our WEC program,” Ferrier explained.
Could appearances in IMSA to bolster GM’s presence at the big Floridian endurance races be on the cards?
“I’d like to, but probably not next year as we are focused on getting the WEC program right first,” he said. “Never say never, though!”

Here is how first and second practices went

 

[teamzr1]

In LMGT3, Corvettes dominated FP3 after leading FP2 on Friday. Daniel Juncadella again set the fastest time in the No. 82 TF Sport Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R (2m05.178s) during the final moments, 0.2s faster than the sister car, the No. 82 of Charlie Eastwood (2m05.351s).

The No. 54 Vista AF Corse Ferrari 296 LMGT3 driven by Davide Rigon was third fastest, some 0.4s behind the fastest Corvette (2m05.542s).
Fourth fastest was the No. 59 United Autosports McLaren 720S LMGT3 Evo (2m05.549s).

Further down the order the LMGT3 Championship leading car, the No. 92 Manthey Pure Rxcing Porsche 911 GT3 R, had another quiet run. Klaus Bachler’s best time landed him 10th in class (2m06.656s).

Elsewhere in the class, Sean Gelael received a 5m stop-and-go penalty for constant abuse of track limits during Friday’s second free practice session.
His car, the No. 31 Team WRT BMW M4 LMGT3, was the slowest of the LMGT3s Saturday morning (2m06.565s).

The session was drama-free, otherwise, even when accounting for a brief yellow for debris on track.

NEXT UP: Qualifying begins Saturday at 3:00 p.m. CT.

 

[teamzr1]

Heart of Racing Team’s Ian James beat Sarah Bovy to take his first WEC pole position in the LMGT3 class.

The No. 27 Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo set a time of 2:05.587 in Hyperpole to outpace the No. 85 Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2 by 0.172 seconds.
Francois Heriau took third aboard the No. 55 Vista AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3, joined on the second row by the No. 92 Manthey PureRxcing Porsche 911 GT3 R in the hands of Alex Malyhkin.
TF Sport’s Corvette Tom van Rompuy took fifth, ahead of the second Ferrari driven by Thomas Flohr and James Cottingham’s No. 59 United Autosports McLaren 720S GT3 Evo.
Clement Mateu, Ben Keating and Darren Leung completed the overall top ten.
Keating, in his first qualifying session aboard the No. 88 Proton Competition Ford Mustang GT3, made it into Hyperpole at a last gasp with a late flyer to go sixth in the first segment of qualifying.

As a result, the No. 95 McLaren was knocked out, as well as both Akkodis ASP Team Lexus RC F GT3s,
the second TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R, the No. 77 Ford, No. 46 BMW M4 GT3, No. 91 Porsche 911 GT3 R and No. 60 Lamborghini.

The six-hour Lone Star Le Mans race kicks off Sunday at 1 p.m. CDT (2 p.m. EDT).

 

[teamzr1]

TF Sport’s No. 81 Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R will start from inside the third of the LMGT3 class ahead of the six-hour Lone Star Le Mans for the FIA World Endurance Championship at Circuit of the Americas.

Tom Van Rompuy qualified fifth in the Corvette that he shares with Rui Andrade and Corvette factory driver Charlie Eastwood.
He set a lap of 2:06.287 (97.680 mph) around the 3.4-mile, 20-turn circuit and site of the WEC’s only American race this season.

The 10-car Hyperpole session was a tight battle, with the No. 81 Corvette just 0.7 seconds from pole position and less than three-tenths from third position. It continued a strong run for Van Rompuy in qualifying sessions this season with his fourth Hyperpole appearance including a pole-position run to open the season at Qatar.

Hiroshi Koizumi barely missed advancing to Hyperpole with a lap of 2:07.328 (96.872 mph) in the No. 82 Corvette Z06 GT3.R that placed him outside the top-10 by just 0.216 seconds.
Still, it’s the best starting spot of the year for the trio of Koizumi, Sebastien Baud and Corvette factory driver Daniel Juncadella since the Qatar opener in February, outside the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Both Corvettes showed well in the three practice sessions across Friday and Saturday. Both Z06 GT3.Rs were the top-five in the first practice, and Juncadella went quickest in Friday’s second session and also Saturday’s final practice.
The latter was TF Sport’s first 1-2 result in any WEC session this year, with Eastwood just off the pace of his teammate.

Although it’s the only American stop for the WEC, this weekend isn’t the first race for the Corvette Z06 GT3.R at COTA this season as DXT Racing swept both rounds of GT World Challenge America with the No. 63 Corvette of factory driver Tommy Milner and Alec Udell.

Despite a difference in weather conditions in May vs. September and tires – Pirelli vs. Goodyear, a large amount of data and experience carried over to help TF Sport prep for the weekend. From an engineering perspective, suspension and other points in chassis setup with validations from Chevrolet’s Driver in the Loop simulator provided a solid baseline for the weekend’s initial track action.

This is the first FIA WEC race at Circuit of the Americas since 2020. That race was significant in that it was the first start in the championship for the mid-engine Corvette C8.R while TF Sport went on to win the GTE-Am class with Eastwood as one of the drivers.
The team got a feel for Austin and Americana on Thursday with a couple of visits to some of Austin’s most notable landmarks, with Juncadella and Eastwood each driving a Corvette Z06 production car for the weekend.

The Lone Star Le Mans is scheduled for 1 p.m. CT on Sunday, September 1. MotorTrend TV will air live television coverage with streaming coverage on the FIA WEC app and the MAX app in the U.S. Radio Le Mans also will stream audio coverage of the race.

TF SPORT POST-QUALIFYING DRIVER QUOTES

TOM VAN ROMPUY, NO. 81 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“From my side, qualifying was a little disappointing because we had a really strong car. It’s really close to P2 through P4. Our only way is up tomorrow, so we feel ready for the race and are hoping for a big podium finish tomorrow. From the first session here at COTA, we have felt that we have a really good car.
I think our package is quite strong, and everyone is ready for a good result.

Now it’s just putting the small things together. With the combination of our three drivers, I think we have a strong shot for a good result. From P5, we can do a good job. It’s a long race, and tire degradation in the heat will play a role and play its part. Let’s hope for the best tomorrow.”

CHARLIE EASTWOOD, NO. 81 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“We have a pretty good starting place for tomorrow. It’s been promising through practice as well. Rui had his best session of the year in FP3 and is showing some really good pace. We just need to put it all together. We’ve had a fast car the last couple of races, but we haven’t put it together.
Furthermore, we’re probably in the best position we have been in a while, so I’m looking forward to it.”

HIROSHI KOIZUMI, NO. 82 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“I am happy with my qualifying time. It is the closest I have been to Hyperpole. I feel like I was better in the free practice session, so I will try to remember those laps in the race and how I did, so I can do a good job for my co-drivers and my team. Turn 11 was difficult for me, and I know I can clean up that for better laps tomorrow in the race.”

DANI JUNCADELLA, NO. 82 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“This is the best chance we have had this for a good result. With the performance and setup, we seem to be in the right place and the right window. Hiroshi’s position doesn’t tell the whole story. He wasn’t that far from Hyperpole.
So I have high expectations for tomorrow, I have to say, with the sister car being in the top-five and competitive pace. We can all be quite satisfied with what we look like for the race.”

SEBASTIEN BAUD, NO. 82 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“This is my first time in Austin and in fact in the U.S. It’s a great event and the home race for Corvette.
I’m happy for that because there are a lot of fans that follow Corvette. This weekend is a great opportunity to achieve a strong result.
The performance of the car so far has been really good. It’s a technical track and is very nice for our Corvette, it seems.

We have a lot of information on this track from other Corvettes. That hopefully will help. It’s going to be important to stay on the same lap early as the leaders.
I like the track so far and the car is very fast through the technical parts. I think we have the chance for a very good result.”

 

[teamzr1]

Bad race for the 2 C8 Z06s

Heart of Racing Team captured its first series class win in dominant fashion, converting pole position to come out on top in the LMGT3 class.
Ian James, Daniel Mancinelli and Alex Riberas, sharing the No. 27 Aston Martin Vantage GT3 Evo, finished nearly 30 seconds ahead of the No. 92 Manthey PureRxcing Porsche 911 GT3 R.

After James rebuffed an early challenge from the No. 85 Iron Dames Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2, the American squad went largely unchallenged out front.
It marked the first world championship victory for Aston Martin’s updated GT3 challenger.

Klaus Bachler, Alex Malykhin and Joel Sturm were joined on the class podium by their Manthey stablemates Yasser Shahin, Morris Schuring and Richard Lietz in third.

The No. 91 Manthey EMA Porsche was promoted to third when the No. 55 Vista AF Corse Ferrari 296 GT3 was ordered to serve a 100-second stop-and-hold penalty for a technical infringement.

This dropped them to tenth in class, while the No. 59 United Autosports McLaren 720S GT3 Evo moved up to fourth and the No. 31 BMW M4 GT3 finished fifth.
WRT’s No. 46 entry lost out on a possible top-five after Maxime Martin brought into the pits with power steering problems late on, resulting in a retirement.

Other cars to hit trouble in the race include the No. 81 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R and No. 85 Lamborghini, which both suffered damage as a result of a clash between Rahel Frey and Rui Andrade in the third hour.

 

[teamzr1]

TF Sport’s Daniel Juncadella drove through the field and into the points as the No. 82 Chevy Corvette Z06 GT3.R placed eighth in the LMGT3 class of the FIA World Endurance Championship at the end of Sunday’s Lone Star Le Mans six-hour race.

The trio of factory driver Juncadella plus teammates Hiroshi Koizumi and Sebastien Baud finished in the class top-10 and scored points for the fourth time this season. After Koizumi started and Baud drove the middle stints of the race, Juncadella got in the Corvette with just under two-and-a-half hours left and 15th place in class. He carved his way through the field as the trio rebounded from two drive-through penalties.

Juncadella’s race pace came as no surprise, as he was the fastest driver in the final two practice sessions of the event.
TF Sport’s No. 81 Corvette suffered the cruelest of luck as mid-race contact and its after-effects took the trio of Charlie Eastwood, Rui Andrade and Tom Van Rompuy from contending for a podium and possible victory to out of the race with approximately one hour to go.

Van Rompuy started fifth and quickly jumped into podium position inside the first 15 minutes. After his double-stint, Andrade climbed aboard and ran fifth due to the class pit stop cycle. Like his teammate, Andrade wasted no time in moving up and quickly grabbed second place before contact from the No. 85 Lamborghini damaged the left front bodywork of the Corvette.

Following the driver change from Andrade to Eastwood, only minutes before Juncadella took over the sister Corvette, the real damage from the hit began to rear its head. The team was forced to bring the No. 81 into the garage to swap out the toe link, but additional problems continued to surface before the car was retired.
TF Sport is back in action in two weeks at the Six Hours of Fuji from Fuji Speedway in Japan.

TF SPORT POST-QUALIFYING DRIVER QUOTES

DANI JUNCADELLA, NO. 82 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“It was clear that we were going to be very competitive today. I had no doubt that if I got in the car in the last two hours in contention for a top result, that we would get it. Hiroshi surprised me in the first stint. That was very good from his side, but unfortunately the second one he struggled a bit more.

We were only about 90 seconds down. Seb was competitive, and I knew we could get some of it back. But we lost about 35 seconds on the stop because the door latch on the passenger side was stuck, so we went a lap down, but he did well to get it back to show the amount of pace in the car.

Then there were some penalties to lose some ground. Whenever I jump in the car, I take every race with the same approach and give 100 percent.
There is always something to learn. I thoroughly enjoyed those two-and-a-half hours driving a really fast Corvette.”

CHARLIE EASTWOOD, NO. 81 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“This is one that slipped away, definitely. The Corvette has been incredible from FP1 all the way through.
Unfortunately, the contact Rui had from the Iron Dames popped the toe link out on the rear-left. The car was grabbing and things down the straight pretty badly, but we still had a pretty good pace even with it not being 60 percent right. We just tried a few things, but it still wasn’t right.
There was no point putting anything at risk and called it a day. It’s a shame.”

TOM VAN ROMPUY, NO. 81 CHEVROLET CORVETTE Z06 GT3.R:

“Really frustrating. This is the best the car has felt this year. From the start, we had a wonderful car.
I managed to pull up two positions to P3 and tried to stay close to P2 and P1 and kept them in sight.

I did some energy savings to get the maximum out of our laps, so we gained a bit on that.
Furthermore, I had to let one of the BMWs go because he was a Pro driver, but I managed to have a good fight with him before I let him go.
I had a lot of fun out there.”