Aston success at end of WRL's latest 8+8Hr event over the bumps of Sebring

Tuesday, November 14, 2023

Last weekend’s penultimate round of the World Racing League Series from the Sebring International Raceway in Florida proved itself to be a successful one for many of the Aston Martin Racing runners, although some certainly didn’t have it all their own way.

For this events 8 + 8-hour race format drew the attention of over sixty runners within the WRL’s multi-class format with four Aston Martin Racing powered crews featuring amongst them with their allotted GTO class.

Two crews from the David Tuaty lead TLM Racing outfit saw the bright red #172 entry of Jim Hamman, JP Southern and Tom Herb take to the infamous bumps of the former wartime airfield circuit alongside the #888 ‘Mona’ with the young Zang O’Shaunessy behind the wheel of his father’s car, supported again by the more experienced racers in Pippa Mann and Troy Ermish.

The locally based Automatic Racing team were also in attendance with their older iteration #909 AMR Vantage GT4 that Ramin Abdolvahabi would have shared with Jim Cox for the weekend had it not been for repeated electrical/fuel pump issues that side lined the car for much of the weekend.

They in turn was joined by another new to AMR team in 89X Motorsport who had acquired both a Vantage GT8R and Vantage GT4 from New Zealand ahead of their racing debut in them lats weekend. More akin to American muscle cars, this would be a racing test for their driving duo of Mike Fitzpatrick and Sebastian Vassen.

In Saturdays opener, the #888 started the highest in P7 where they were able to come home P5 overall (P4 in class) despite the loss of their air conditioning whilst the debuting 89X #89 car home just two places behind in their first ever AMR powered race to finish P7 overall and P6 in class with the #172 finishing immediately behind them to make it a rather successful race 1 outing.

Sundays second eight-hour race was much the same, but the #172 car did start from pole position, but race issues and fatigue did creep in which did affect their respective results.

The #888 car again finished P4 in class (this time still on the lead lap as opposed to be being one lap down to the winners on Saturday whilst the #172 eventually finished P8 in class with the #89 crew P15.

The season moves onto the Circuit of the Americas where their 2023 season will conclude at the start of December with another 8 + 8 Hr event – sadly alongside the final race for the Aston Martin Racing supporting CSJ Motorsport crew of Cy and Susan Jary (amongst others) who have grown the American marketplace to the scale that we have seen this season and whose presence within the paddock will be sorely missed.

Those were the words from one team manager this weekend, not ours!!

Photo credits – Teams / social media / Tom Beer Photo