Magnus Racing earns Brickyard Grand Prix podium and holds GT points lead

Indianapolis. Porsche customer teams captured three of the top 10 positions in today’s Brickyard Grand Prix at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS). The three-hour GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series’ endurance race held on the road course of the world famous racing facility provided a showcase for multiple teams campaigning the Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car.

#44 Magnus Racing Porsche GT3: Andy Lally, John Potter

Photo by: Jay Alley

In the race’s second running, it was GT points-leading Magnus Racing who took the greatest advantage of the track which combines both parts of the The Brickyard’s famous oval and infield road course to finish third. Two other Porsche customer teams, Snow Racing with Wright Motorsports and Park Place Motorsports, also took top 10 finishes.

Although Magnus Racing’s No. 44 Porsche was not able to repeat its race-winning performance of 2012, the team of Andy Lally (Atlanta) and John Potter (Salt Lake City, Utah) did earn another podium performance in the 16-car GT class field. In the process, Lally led 24 of the 103 laps covered in three hours of racing on the 2.534-mile, 13-turn circuit.

By virtue of the run, the team increased the Rolex GT class championship lead that they have held for much of the season. Magnus has a four point lead over the No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Chevrolet Camaro, 229 points to 225.

"As always, if we can't win the race we can at least be satisfied with top Porsche,” said Potter from his second-consecutive Indianapolis podium. “The team did an excellent job, and Andy fought all day. We had a ton of guests with us through Flex-Box and The Private Client Reserve of U.S. Bank, so I'm glad we were able to deliver a podium."

Teammate Lally said: “Third is about the best we could hope for today, so it was a good result. We played a great strategy, and it worked as well as we could have hoped. The team was perfect as always, and I'm really happy to still hold the point lead."

Snow Racing with Wright Motorsports had their most impressive performance to date leading 14 laps late in the race with drivers Andrew Davis (Athens, Ga.) and Madison Snow (Lehi, Utah). What the team believes was a broken transmission mount in the closing stages of the race would drop them from the lead to seventh. Despite this, it remains the team’s strongest Rolex Series performance to date in a limited schedule.

“Really proud of the effort put forth by Snow Racing with Wright Motorsports,” said Davis. “For a 17 year-old, Madison had a stellar drive out there today. He held his own against some of the best sports car drivers in the world, got all the way up to second and put pressure on [Andy] Lally in the championship leading Porsche.

We ran a different strategy so we knew we’d be able to stay out when everyone else pitted. We got into the lead with everyone pitting and then I just tried to build a gap. Unfortunately, about 30-minutes from the end we had a transmission issue. We would have had to pit for fuel anyway but we’d have been able to get back out and fight for a podium finish.”

Also making their best showing of the year despite another limited schedule was the No. 71 Park Place Motorsports Porsche of Jason Hart (Flower Mound, Texas) and John McCutchen (Dallas). After falling back early, the pair overcame to take 10th in class.

The Park Place sister car, the No. 73 shared by Patrick Lindsey (Santa Barbara, Calif.) and Porsche factory driver Patrick Long (Playa del Rey, Calif.) ran in the top five for much of the day leading a total of four laps. They would finish 11th after a broken shift linkage ended their day with only minutes to go.

“I can't be prouder of the Park Place guys and the way they executed today,” reviewed Lindsey. “Everything clicked and went our way until 20 minutes to go. Pat [Long] experienced a shift linkage failure and we had to give up the race and park it. I'm definitely disappointed, but deeply grateful of the effort and sacrifice of this crew and extremely blessed to be in this position.”

The No. 18 Muehlner Motorsports America Porsche 911 GT3 Cup entry of five-time Indy 500 veteran Eliseo Salazar (Chile), Eduardo Costabal (Chile) and Damien Faulkner (Ireland) finished 15th.

The GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series will now travel to Road America in Elkhart Lake, Wisc. for a professional sports car doubleheader. The August 10th -11th weekend will see the Rolex Series compete in a two-hour, 45-minute race on Saturday while the American Le Mans Series will have a race of the same length on Sunday.

It marks the first, and only, time the two series will race at the same track on the same weekend. The two will merge in 2014 to create United SportsCar Racing (USCR).

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