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SCC: Daytona: APR Motorsports race report

APR Motorsport Excited About the Season to Come After the Fresh From Florida 200 APR Motorsport left Daytona after the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge opening race optimistic about the remainder of the season. The Audi S4 in GS Class and the ...

APR Motorsport Excited About the Season to Come After the Fresh From Florida 200

APR Motorsport left Daytona after the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge opening race optimistic about the remainder of the season. The Audi S4 in GS Class and the two VW GTi's in ST performed as expected despite some unavoidable mishaps. Ian Baas and Mark White were able to make many improvements in position to as high as 5th until a flat tire ended their charge as time was winding down. The 181 GTi driven by Josh Hurley and Kevin Stadtlander was as high as 4th place until another competitor rear ended the VW spinning Josh off the track. Mike Sweeney and Mike Halpin in 171 were keeping pace with Hurley and Stadtlander, usually only a couple of positions behind, until multiple impacts of less severity than the incident involving 181 forced Mike Sweeney to drop back and coax the GTi to the finish line.

Director of Motorsport for APR, Jeff Mishtawy, said "APR and their engineering team proved once again their abilities to prepare the cars for competition. The S4 and the GTi's were in excellent condition and ready for the race. I'm excited about the rest of the season as our development progresses and the drivers continue to settle in."

Mark White of Accumoto and driver of the #01 Audi S4 had to say, "My hat is off to APR for taking the Audi S4 from concept to execution in such a short period of time. It's incredibly difficult to develop a solid racecar from a brand new-to-the-market street car because there is no blueprint to follow. Nobody has done it before. You do not have the luxury of being able to learn from other's mistakes so every decision in the development process becomes doubly critical as there is no safety net of prior data to fall back on. It's a real testament to the maturity of the team and my teammate Ian to be able to bring home a finish in the S4's debut and I am proud to have been part of that effort."

After the first race of a season expected to see multiple podiums for the two GTi's in ST, Josh Hurley was in good spirits despite the forced off- track excursion, "I was really in a great place to push for the win as time was winding down. The GTi was in great form and Kevin drove very well in the first half of the race to give us a chance to charge for the podium."

Mike Sweeney and Mike Halpin in the 171 GTi were both looking forward to things to come after the inaugural race as well. "The car was up to it. My co-driver was up to it. We were ready to take over for Josh after his incident and race to the podium but our car suffered similar struggles as well. It was all I could do to get the car to the finish after being hit several times by other drivers," said Sweeney. The 171 GTi was not running optimally after one of the late hits seemed to have damaged the intercooler.

With the season opener successfully behind them, APR Motorsport returns to their home base in Opelika, AL to prepare for the upcoming Homestead-Miami Speedway race March 5th and 6th.

-source: apr motorsports

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