2014 News

ESM Patrón Ready for Long Beach Street Battle

THAW  354582337aafNo. 2 qualifies seventh; No. 1 qualifies eighth
 
Long Beach, Calif. – Extreme Speed Motorsports (ESM) took to the streets today in preparation of 100 minutes of wheel-to-wheel combat through the narrow, bumpy streets and unforgiving walls of the 1.968-mile, 11-turn Long Beach layout that plays host to the Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase, round three of the TUDOR United SportsCar Championship.
 
During Friday’s qualifying session Ryan Dalziel, co-driver of the No. 1 Tequila Patrón Honda Performance Development ARX-03b (HPD), was running strong laps at the start of the 15-minute qualifying session. On his fifth lap, the No. 1 machine lost drive and stopped on course which drew the red flag. Dalziel was towed back to the where the team determined a transmission component failure prevented Dalziel from completing the session. Per the IMSA rulebook, the No. 1 team lost its fastest lap for causing a red flag during qualifying, which made the car’s official qualifying lap a 1:17.833 (91.026 mph).
 
The No. 1 machine will start from the eighth position on the grid. Scott Sharp, defending prototype winner, is slated to drive the opening stint of Saturday’s race. Dalziel will drive second.
 
Johannes van Overbeek qualified the No. 2 Tequila Patrón Honda Performance Development ARX-03b (HPD).  Van Overbeek ran a best lap of 1:17.129 (91.857 mph) which placed the No. 2 machine in the seventh position on the grid.
 
At the start of Saturday’s Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase at Long Beach, Ed Brown will be behind the wheel of the No. 2 machine and van Overbeek will drive the second stint.
 
The Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase at Long Beach on April 11-12 is the third race of 2014 TUDOR United SportsCar Championship. Green flag for the Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase is 6:05 p.m. PT on Saturday, April 12.
 
Live coverage of the Tequila Patrón Sports Car Showcase at Long Beach can be seen from flag-to-flag on the FOX Sports 1 network at 6 p.m. PT. The race will also stream live on IMSA.com.
 
RYAN DALZIEL
“We were running respectable times during qualifying. I felt the car was going to be toward the front; I think we could have run: 15s. I’m not sure what happened; we lost drive. It is obviously disappointing. We all put a lot of work into these race weekends and the guys worked really hard all day. We’ll fix this and we’ll do our best tomorrow. On one hand, it gives us an opportunity to go a little bit off our strategy and see how that works out for us. It was just one of those days.
 
“Track position is nice in our car. It is difficult for us to pass the DPs, so it would have been nice to start up front. The good thing is that we have pace in the car. I think we can run up front like we did at Sebring.”
 
“This isn’t going to be an easy race. Scott is going to have the hard job because it will probably be a hectic start, but sometimes starting at the back is an advantage. We have a plan based on qualifying and we’ll probably stick to that plan. The guys will do a great job with strategy and will have a smooth pit stop. We’ll do the best we can tomorrow; that’s all we can do.” 
 
JOHANNES VAN OVERBEEK
“We were struggling a little bit but we kept making the car better and faster. Ryan definitely has these Continental tires sorted out, and I’m still coming to grips with them. The qualifying run was the fastest we had today. The car is doing better and as long as the race is green for a while tomorrow, we’ll be in pretty good shape.
 
“I’m really busy in the car. I’m sideways, understeer, bouncing down the track. It is a rough ride, for sure.  It should be a good race and I’m hoping for a good result. Then we’ll have some Tequila Patrón afterward.”