Backstretch Motorsports

Pairing scores overall victory in return to debut venue

A year ago, Gil de Ferran and Simon Pagenaud were elated with a third-place finish in their American Le Mans Series debut at Miller Motorsports Park. Oh, how times have changed. The de Ferran Motorsports pairing dominated the Larry H. Miller Dealerships Utah Grand Prix on Sunday for their second overall victory in a row.

Pagenaud took the checkered flag in the team’s Acura ARX-02a by a comfortable 73.693 seconds over Patrón Highcroft Racing’s David Brabham and Scott Sharp. The winning duo led all but two laps as Pagenaud qualified on pole position and posted the fastest race lap for the second year in a row. The Frenchman and his Brazilian mentor also won the previous round at Long Beach. [read more...]

Scott Dixon turned in the fastest time on the final day of the American Le Mans Series’ annual Winter Test on Wednesday. The reigning Indy 500 and IndyCar champion turned a lap of 1:45.671 (126.052 mph) in the morning session at Sebring International Raceway for de Ferran Motorsports.

The new Acura ARX-02a LMP1 entry that Dixon drove Wednesday morning was fastest in all but one of the eight sessions throughout the week. Teammate Simon Pagenaud has the week’s quickest time, a 1:44.814 (127.082 mph) from Tuesday morning. His time bettered Marco Werner’s standing qualifying record around the famed 17-turn, 3.7-mile layout, set in 2007 in an Audi R10 TDI. Pagenaud, Dixon and team owner Gil de Ferran will team for the season-opening Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Fresh from Florida on March 21.

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Gil de Ferran won his third straight pole position at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course on Friday…seven years since his last. The storybook debut season for De Ferran Motorsports continued with de Ferran’s first pole in the American Le Mans Series, a record-breaking 1:07.969 (119.596 mph) for the Acura Sports Car Challenge.

De Ferran’s Acura ARX-01b led a second straight overall sweep of the front row for Acura in a home race before thousands of Honda and Acura employees and guests. The two-time CART and former Indianapolis 500 winner qualified 0.224 seconds ahead of Patrón Highcroft Racing’s David Brabham, who sat on the pole a week ago at Lime Rock and won the race overall with Scott Sharp.

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It wasn’t perfect but Alex Figge’s first day back in the American Le Mans Series wasn’t bad either. The former open-wheel regular got his first taste of GT2 competition Friday at Miller Motorsports Park behind the wheel of Tafel Racing’s No. 73 Ferrari F430 GT.

Figge will partner with team owner Jim Tafel this weekend in the Larry H. Miller Dealerships Utah Grand Prix presented by the Grand and Little America Hotels. After testing recently at Road Atlanta, Friday was Figge’s first time racing amongst four classes of sports cars since July 2005. The Ferrari finished Friday’s test session 11th in GT2.

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De Ferran Motorsports’ debut in the American Le Mans Series is getting closer and closer each day. The newest member of the Acura Motorsports stable will make its highly anticipated first start at next week’s Larry H. Miller Dealerships Utah Grand Prix presented by the Grand and Little America Hotels. So what’s going through team owner and driver Gil de Ferran’s mind as his first start in the Series approaches?

“It’s hard to imagine that just a few months ago this was just a conversation,” said de Ferran, who will team with fellow newcomer Simon Pagenaud. “We still have a lot of preparation to go through. We still are getting used to running the car and so on and so forth.

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