Mercer Motorsports Thunderhill 25H preview

Mercer Motorsports to Defend 25 Hours of Thunderhill Title

December 2, 2010 - Willows, CA - Mercer Motorsports, winners of the 2009 25 Hours of Thunderhill, will defend its record-setting run in the 2010 edition of the race, run on December 4-5 at Thunderhill Raceway in Willows, CA. The team, which entered three IMSA Patron Challenge races in 2010, captured the 2010 Pirelli Driver's Cup in a 2009 Porsche Cup Car, driven by Rich Walton. The team will race on the 3.0-mile Northern California road course in a Jerry Woods Enterprises and Motorsports Solutions-prepped 2010 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup Car.

Mercer Motorsports' 2010 effort at the 25 Hours will reprise many of the drivers and technical talents that brought the team victory last year. Returning to the team for 2010 will be Rich Walton, Johannes van Overbeek, Tommy Sadler and Jon Fogarty, and joining them will be Guy Cosmo.

Walton is a two-time overall winner at the 25 Hours of Thunderhill and van Overbeek is a former Porsche Cup winner and frequent race winner in ALMS and Grand-Am competition. Tommy Sadler is a 25 Hours overall winner, podium finisher in his first World Challenge race and two-time recipient of the ALMS' coveted 'Crew Chief of the Year' Award. Jon Fogarty is a former Toyota Atlantic Champion and two-time Grand-Am Rolex Series DP Champion, while Guy Cosmo is a longtime sportscar racing standout and teammate to van Overbeek in the Tequila Patron-sponsored Extreme Speed Motorsports Ferrari F430 GT in ALMS competition.

Owned by Scott Mercer, CEO of a fabless semiconductor company headquartered in Newport Beach, CA, the team's operation in Willows will be run, as it was in 2009, by Thomas Blam, the veteran strategist who has steered his teams to team and drivers' championships many times over.

The 25 Hours of Thunderhill now in its 9th year, is sanctioned by the National Auto Sport Association and will be contested by an estimated 75 teams. Participating teams come from NASA itself, the SCCA, ALMS and Grand-Am, and enter cars ranging from 2010 Porsche Cup cars to BMW E30s to Mazda Miatas. Honda, in particular, uses the race as a testbed for racing versions of its new cars, this year including CRZs and Fits. The mix of vehicle types and experience levels of the drivers makes for a challenging and interesting event, and the field size guarantees action for each of the 25 hours.

van Overbeek said, "Thunderhill has a special place in my heart. My very first car race coincided with the grand-opening of Thunderhill in 1993 - it's one of my home tracks and it offers variety and challenges not found at many tracks. I'm excited to be back with Mercer Motorsports with the same core group to defend our 2009 victory. Having the technical support of Porsche, Michelin and Pagid helps us be really well prepared, so we feel we'll be competitive from the get-go. 70-plus cars, unpredictable weather and huge speed disparity adds to the drama and experience of the 25 hours at Thunderhill; last year we completed 721 laps and there wasn't a dull one."

-source: mercer motorsports