{"id":2761,"date":"2020-11-13T14:19:26","date_gmt":"2020-11-13T19:19:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/?p=2761"},"modified":"2023-05-03T16:32:35","modified_gmt":"2023-05-03T20:32:35","slug":"stoner-car-care-racing-qualifies-for-imsa-season-finale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/2020\/11\/13\/stoner-car-care-racing-qualifies-for-imsa-season-finale\/","title":{"rendered":"Stoner Car Care Racing Qualifies for IMSA Season Finale"},"content":{"rendered":"

SEBRING, Fla.\u00a0(12 November 2020) \u2013\u00a0The\u00a0Stoner Car Care Racing fielded by Automatic Racing\u00a0team placed its\u00a0pair of Aston Martin Vantage GT4s solidly in the final field of the\u00a02020 Michelin\u00a0Pilot Challenge\u00a0season on\u00a0Thursday. The\u00a0Alan Jay Automotive Network 120\u00a0at Sebring International Raceway is set for a green flag start on Friday at 12:00pm ET on TRACKPASS.<\/p>\n

The two-car team of Rob Ecklin Jr. and Ramin Abdolvahabi in the No. 09 Stoner Car Care Aston Martin Vantage GT4, and Gary Ferrera and Kris Wilson in the No. 99 Invisible Glass Aston Martin\u00a0handled\u00a0the changing\u00a0weather\u00a0conditions Thursday to place the\u00a0pair side-by-side in Row Nine for\u00a0Friday\u2019s Grand Sport class starting grid.<\/p>\n

With Hurricane Eta sidestepping the Sebring area, the team\u00a0enjoyed\u00a0dry\u00a0conditions throughout the day, though skies threatened.\u00a0The\u00a0team put the Aston Martins through their paces\u00a0during\u00a0two practice sessions\u00a0on the 3.74-mile,\u00a017-turn former Army airfield,\u00a0though the early hour of the first practice, under cool and cloudy skies,\u00a0put the team in a conundrum. The team faced very little rubber on the track after overnight rains and both cars experienced\u00a0a push, which sent the team back to the garage to make setup changes ahead of practice two in the afternoon on Thursday.<\/p>\n

When it came time for practice two\u00a0Wilson put\u00a0down a quick lap late in practice to place\u00a0the No. 99 Aston Martin\u00a0in 11th, while Abdolvahabi and Ecklin fought a loose condition. Team engineers made more adjustments and the team prepared for the 15-minute qualifying session, taking the green as the sun began to set. Once again, the cars reacted very differently to the changes, with Ferrera settling into the setup quite well while Abdolvahabi found the Aston Martin even more unpredictable.\u00a0The pair will start together in Row Nine, with each driver putting down their quickest laps of the day \u2013 Abdolvahabi with a lap at 2:15.090 and Ferrera with a 2:15.349.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe car turned better with the setup changes,\u00a0but the front end was moving too much. We got that handled, and it felt better,\u201d said Ferrera. \u201cIt was our quickest\u00a0lap,\u00a0and I was very happy with it. I do feel that\u00a0if\u00a0I could have put it all together, I could have gained a second, but all in all, I\u2019m good with the car.\u00a0This is the softer compound tire so tire degradation will be higher,\u00a0which meanstire management will be key tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFor some reason, the car is reacting very strangely, and I\u2019m finding myself trying to catch up,\u201d said Abdolvahabi. \u201cThat was our quickest\u00a0time of the day but it\u2019s two seconds off what I was hoping for. I\u2019m losing time, so I need to look at the data. The front and rear don\u2019t feel connected: they\u2019re\u00a0each\u00a0singing a slightly different tune and that makes the car unsettled in certain turns. Braking and turning is fine, but at the apex, things are going haywire, so we\u2019ll have to figure that out. We\u2019ll just have to go fast tomorrow!\u201d<\/p>\n

Part of the\u00a0IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship\u2019s\u00a0Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring, the\u00a0Alan Jay Automotive Network 120 takes the green flag Friday at 12:05 p.m. Eastern. The race will be broadcast live in the U.S. on NBC Sports Gold\u2019s TrackPass, while international viewers can watch via IMSA.tv. IMSA Radio will also be available at IMSA.com. NBCSN will broadcast a two-hour race recap on Tuesday, November 24 at 4:00 p.m. Eastern (check local listings).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

SEBRING, Fla.\u00a0(12 November 2020) \u2013\u00a0The\u00a0Stoner Car Care Racing fielded by Automatic Racing\u00a0team placed its\u00a0pair of Aston Martin Vantage GT4s solidly in the final field of the\u00a02020 [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":2762,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2761","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2761","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2761"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2761\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2763,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2761\/revisions\/2763"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2762"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2761"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2761"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sundaymanagement.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2761"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}