GTM Nets Highest Finish Ever at 25 Hours and Team Thunder Valley Racing Overcomes Roll-Over Crash in Type 65 Coupe!
Tearm Mercer wins for third year in a row.
It was definitely the most dramatic 25 Hours of Thunderhill of the nine years since we’ve been taking on this monster race. Of the Factory Five cars on the track, the GTM campaigned by Rich Migliori and his Team PDG finished in an impressive 4th place overall, the highest finish of any Factory Five in the history of this event!
Rich’s GTM completed 676 laps and ran a best lap time of 1:55.159 to finish 4th overall and in the extremely competitive ES class. Being beaten by Team Mercer Motorsports 911 GT3, a car that has won this event three years in a row, is hugely impressive and a testament to the teamwork of the guys.
Check out the photos below and linked videos for more news on this year’s 25 Hours of Thunderhill.
Photo courtesy of forum member FFR#63
Team Thunder Valley Racing suffered a set-back in qualifying when Dave Riha (former FFR engineer and current LM employee) went off track and rolled the car! The car was fixed that night with modest damage to the body and was ready at the start of the race. The Coupe earned a 1st place finish in the six hour section (some cars ran a 6 hour enduro) and went on to finish the race ending in 38th place overall out of 83 cars. The Type 65 Coupe, owned by Karen Salvaggio, completed 545 laps with a best lap time of 1:58.195.
Photos courtesy of Karen Salvaggio
GoRacingTV.com interviews Karen Salvaggio on her Type 65 Coupe with some track and crash footage.
Photo courtesy of forum member FFR#63
Team Boothman ran exceptionally fast lap times with a best lap time of 1:55.833, only about a half a second slower than the GTM, but mechanical gremlins struck again this year. In the middle of the night, a clutch center failed and then after that had been fixed, a fuel cell ruptured and caused the car to catch on fire. The car completed 464 laps before being taken out of the race at 18 hours.
Photos courtesy of Karen Salvaggio
Factory Five Challenge Series Driver Tom Coons, owner of Team Kneed Adjustment Racing, ran the first six hours of the race in his orange and silver Factory Five Challenge Series car (2011 Spec), to round out a four car Factory Five field out of 83 entrants.