It took Christina Nielsen, Patrick Long and the Wright Motorsports team nearly eight months to achieve a podium finish in the 2018 IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship season, but when they did, they were victorious. Sunday’s Continental Tire Road Race Showcase at Road America yielded the result — and win — the entire Porsche team has been working towards.
The victory should come as no surprise to those who are familiar with the team and drivers, all world-class talents who have been relentless in their quest for a podium finish at tracks around North America but have been handed one tough break after another. This time, the No. 58 Porsche Consulting/Porsche Digital Porsche 911 GT3 R started the race in pole position and finished the two-hour, 40-minute event on the top step of the winner’s podium at Victory Lane after flawless execution by the team and drivers.
“Amazing weekend by Wright Motorsports!” Nielsen said after the race. “The thing that’s important to remember with these kinds of weekends is that we wanted redemption for our bad luck at the last race, where we should have earned our first podium finish. Our team really came together there, and we’ve been waiting for this for a long time. We’ve been pushing for it to happen, and finally, everything came together this weekend.
“How well we did at Road America is a testimony to how strong the team is, and has been, for the past two weekends. The track is like a living creature. It keeps changing. You might have feedback and data from the year before, but it’s never going to be completely the same. The teams that adjust the quickest are going be the most competitive. We came out of Lime Rock strong, but we knew we needed to come back and start from scratch to be competitive at Road America.
“So, this weekend is a testimony to the strength of the team and how well they did,” she continued. “The car was amazing to drive, and the handling was so good — it was simply a pleasure to drive. Pat did a great job putting it on pole yesterday. The way Rob, our engineer, set up the strategy, and how well the pit stops were executed — it was just a weekend that was really strong. Our first podium, which we’ve been so hungry for this season, ended up being a victory, which is perfection.”
Nielsen’s next race is the Michelin GT Challenge at Virginia International Raceway from August 17 to 19.
Source. Christina Nielsen
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