Team Falken Tire Porsche 911 RSR Repeats At Petit Le Mans

Subtitle:SRT Motorsports Doubles Up With GTLM Team, Driver Championships

Team Falken Tire closed out one era of the Petit Le Mans powered by Mazda with a victory last season, and opened up a new era Saturday with a breakthrough victory in the first TUDOR United SportsCar Championship race at Road Atlanta with its No. 17 Porsche 911 RSR.

Meanwhile, SRT Motorsports won both team and driver championships in the GT Le Mans (GTLM) class as Jonathan Bomarito, Rob Bell and Dominik Farnbacher nursed the No. 93 Dodge Viper SRT GTS-R to the inaugural TUDOR Championship team title. Kuno Wittmer drove the No. 91 Dodge Viper SRT GTS-R to the driver championship after sharing the No. 93 entry most of the season with Bomarito.

Bryan Sellers and Wolf Henzler repeated their 2013 triumph for Team Falken Tire in the final race for the American Le Mans Series presented by Tequila Patrón, and were joined in this year’s victory by Marco Holzer. It wasn’t easy, however, as Henzler had to hold off a late-race charge from the No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR of Michael Christensen following a full-course caution.

“Before the restart, I asked and they said there were a couple of prototypes between us [and second place], so I thought maybe I’d be safe,” said Henzler, who beat Christensen to the stripe by a mere 0.937 seconds. “I had three laps and I was able to keep my pace and keep him behind. He never could really attack me, but he was close.”

The No. 93 Dodge Viper SRT GTS-R entered the race with a seven-point lead in the season-long team championship ahead of the No. 3 Corvette Racing Corvette C7.R. After Jan Magnussen was caught up in a pit-road incident two hours, 45 minutes into the race in the No. 3 Corvette, SRT Motorsports was suddenly in the catbird seat. But what appeared to be a rather smooth drive to the championship certainly was not as the team had to nurse a hot gearbox throughout much of the 10-hour race.

It was a sixth-place finish for the team and Bomarito, who entered the race with a share of the points lead with regular co-driver Wittmer. In a bid to increase its odds for a championship, Wittmer moved to the team’s No. 91 entry and secured the driver championship with a third-place finish in the car co-driven by Marc Goossens and reigning Indy 500 winner Ryan Hunter-Reay.

“To be honest, I’m a bit upside down on emotions due to the fact that Jonathan can’t be sitting beside me,” said Wittmer. “He deserves it just as much as I do. We worked all season to be in this type of position to get a point lead. Strategically we got split for Petit, which makes sense, because one of us did win.”

The No. 912 Porsche North America Porsche 911 RSR driven by Christensen, Patrick Long and Earl Bamber finished second to win the Tequila Patrón North American Endurance Cup team championship, while Christensen and Long won the Patrón Endurance Cup driver championship.

Porsche also won the manufacturer championship in the four-race endurance competition, which includes the Rolex 24 At Daytona, Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Fueled by Fresh From Florida and the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen.