ALEX JOB RACING MCKENNA PORSCHE 911 GT3 RS RACERS TOP FIRST DAY QUALIFYING
AT SUPERFLO 12 HOURS AT SEBRING; MAASSEN HOLDS GT POLE
Andy Schupack (401) 739-5677
cell at the track (917) 864-8767
Fred Hammond (201) 750-3533
ALEX JOB RACING MCKENNA PORSCHE 911 GT3 RS RACERS TOP FIRST DAY QUALIFYING AT SUPERFLO 12 HOURS AT SEBRING; MAASSEN HOLDS GT POLE
-Wed. GT preliminary pole chase shows two Porsches, two BMWs and another Porsche in top five; final qualifying Thursday afternoon for Saturday's 12 Hour epic-
SEBRING, Fla. - March 14 2001 - The 2000 American Le Mans Series GT Driver's Champion runner-up Sascha Maassen, from Germany, has set a track record while placing his Alex Job Racing McKenna Porsche 911 GT3 RS on the preliminary pole for Saturday's Superflo 12 Hours at Sebring presented by Dodge.
Maassen, whose co-driver Lucas Luhr put the Porsche on the pole at ALMS round #1 in Texas two weeks ago, said the rest of the qualifying track time on Thursday will be spent setting the car up for the race, not trying to go faster.
"There are no points awarded for the pole, and it's a 12-hour event, so we will hope our time holds up, but spend the track time setting the car up for Saturday," said Maassen, who added that he and Luhr will alternate events as the qualifying driver throughout the 2001 ALMS season. Maassen/Luhr will share the driving chores in the grueling 12-hour contest with Emmanuel Collard of France, a Porsche SuperCup star who also did Formula I test driving.
The other position on the GT class front row is occupied by the Alex Job Racing McKenna Porsche 911 GT3 RS qualified by Randy Pobst, of Melbourne, Fla., who will drive with Germans Christian Menzel and Timo Bernhard, the defending German Carrera Cup champion.
The two PTG Tom Milner-prepared BMWs sit third and fourth, while the White Lightning Porsche 911 GT3 RS of Bob Wollek/Mike Petersen/Johnny Mowlem is fifth.
Porsche is by far the most successful manufacturer to ever race at Sebring, with 17 overall wins, 43 class wins, and an amazing 13 overall winning streak (1976 - 1988).
Final qualifying for the Superflo 12 Hours of Sebring will take place Thursday at 2:30 PM EST for Saturday's event.
The Superflo 12 Hours at Sebring presented by Dodge will be telecast live on the Speedvision network starting at 10:30 AM Eastern time on Saturday, March 17, beginning with the 30 minute pre-race show. Then Speedvision will telecast the entire 12-hour event live starting at 11:00 AM. The race, along with qualifying sessions starting March 14, will be broadcast live on the Le Mans Radio Network, which can be accessed on the Web at www.americanlemans.com.
That same American Le Mans Series web site will also have live timing and scoring during qualifying and the race event.
The official Porsche web site - www.porsche.com - will have qualifying information on the 12 Hours at Sebring for all the Porsches entered, and will file stories and photos during and after the race. Porsche web site users should choose "North America" on the home page when prompted to choose a country, then choose "motorsports," then "motorsport news" to find the ALMS updates.
Other web sites that will follow the overall event include the American Le Mans site mentioned above, the ON TRACK ONLINE site, (www.ontrackonline.com), The Race Site (www.theRaceSite.com), the Speedvision site (www.speedvision.com), Motorsport.com (www.motorsport.com) and the CompuServe site (www.motorsportsforum.com)
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