Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring – Entry List Notebook

By IMSA Wire Service

The 66th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts scheduled for Saturday, March 17 features a 43-car IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship entry list. The field includes 16 Prototypes, nine GT Le Mans (GTLM) cars and 18 GT Daytona (GTD) entries.

Live FOX Sports television coverage of the race begins at 10:30 a.m. ET on FS1 and the entire race will be streamed live on FOX Sports Go with FS1 authentication. Live IMSA Radio coverage is available on IMSA.com, RadioLeMans.com and via SiriusXM Radio. Tickets are available now at SebringRaceway.com.

Notes:

• This year’s Sebring field includes 39 drivers with one previous win in the Twelve Hours. No. 4 Corvette Racing Chevrolet Corvette C7.R driver Oliver Gavin is the winningest active driver with six Sebring wins. His teammate, Jan Magnussen in the No. 3 Corvette Racing Chevrolet Corvette C7.R is second among active drivers with five career wins. Magnussen will be making his 20th Sebring start this year.
• Eleven of the 12 class-winning drivers in the 2017 Twelve Hours are entered for this year’s race. Ricky Taylor will drive the No. 7 Acura Team Penske Acura ARX-05 DPi; Jordan Taylor returns in the 2017 race-winning No. 10 Konica Minolta Cadillac DPi-V.R; the No. 38 Performance Tech Motorsports team that won the Prototype Challenge (PC) class last year returns with the same driver lineup – James French, Kyle Masson and Pato O’Ward – in its new No. 38 ORECA LMP2 Prototype-class entry; the No. 3 Corvette again features Magnussen alongside Antonio Garcia and Mike Rockenfeller; and in the GTD class, Ben Keating and Jeroen Bleekemolen again will share the No. 33 Mercedes-AMG Team Riley Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3, while their 2017 co-driver Mario Farnbacher has moved to the No. 93 Michael Shank Racing with Curb-Agajanian Acura NSX GT3. Only Alex Lynn, whose lone WeatherTech Championship start to date came in the overall-winning No. 10 Konica Minolta Cadillac DPi last year, is missing from this year’s Sebring field.
• The No. 22 Tequila Patrón ESM Nissan DPi is the only car in the field that has three previous overall Sebring winners in its driver lineup. Season-long teammates Johannes van Overbeek and Pipo Derani previously won overall in 2016, while endurance racing teammate Nicolas Lapierre won overall and in the P1 class with Peugeot in 2011.
• There are six cars with complete driver lineups that have at least one class win at Sebring. In addition to the No. 22 Nissan DPi, the No. 38 Performance Tech Motorsports ORECA LMP2 car and the No. 3 Corvette; the No. 54 CORE autosport ORECA LMP2 features a trio of past class winners with two-time PC class winners Jon Bennett and Colin Braun and 2008 P2 and overall winner Romain Dumas. Other complete driver lineups made up of previous class winners include the No. 4 Corvette of six-time winner Gavin and two-time Sebring winners Tommy Milner and Marcel Fassler; and the No. 66 Ford Chip Ganassi Racing Ford GT with three-time Sebring winner Dirk Mueller and two-time winners Joey Hand and Sebastien Bourdais.
• Bill Auberlen, driver of the No. 25 BMW Team RLL BMW M8 GTLM, will be making his 25th Sebring start this year, the most of any active driver. He has three previous Sebring class victories.
• Corvette Racing is the winningest active team in this year’s Twelve Hours with 11 Sebring victories, including the last three consecutive GTLM races. If the team wins its fourth consecutive Twelve Hours this year, it will match its previous-best run of four-straight GTS class wins from 2006 through 2009.
• Two storied sports car programs returning to Sebring this year after sitting out the past several years are each looking for their fifth victories in the Twelve Hours. They also both won in their most recent Sebring races. Joest Racing – which now fields the two-car Mazda Team Joest program – last competed at Sebring in 2013. Two of the team’s three winning drivers that year, Fassler and Oliver Jarvis, who will drive the No. 77 Mazda DPi, are competing in this year’s race. Penske Racing, which fields the two-car Acura Team Penske program, won its most-recent Sebring appearance in 2008, and one of its winning drivers that year, Dumas, will be in this year’s field.
• Porsche is the winningest manufacturer at Sebring with 94 victories, leading its next-closest competitor, Chevrolet, by 54 victories. Eleven of the 13 participating manufacturers in this year’s race have won previously at Sebring.

Previous Race-Winning Drivers (39)

Oliver Gavin – (6) 2001 GTS, 2002 GTS, 2006 GT1, 2007 GT1, 2013 GT, 2016 GTLM

Jan Magnussen – (5) 2006 GT1, 2008 GT1, 2009 GT1, 2015 GTLM, 2017 GTLM

Bill Auberlen – (3) 1995 GTS-2, 1997 GTS-3, 1998 GT3

Dirk Mueller – (3) 2000 GT, 2011 GT, 2012 ALMS GT

Joerg Bergmeister – (3) 2005 GT2, 2008 GT2, 2014 GTLM

Joao Barbosa – (2) 2015 P/Overall, 2012 ALMS P2

Jon Bennett – (2) 2014 PC, 2016 PC

Colin Braun – (2) 2014 PC, 2016 PC

Joey Hand – (2) 2011 GT, 2012 ALMS GT

Sebastien Bourdais – (2) 2015 P/Overall, 2006 GT2

Ryan Briscoe – (2) 2013 P2, 2015 GTLM

Jeroen Bleekemolen – (2) 2013 GTC, 2017 GTD

Patrick Long – (2) 2005 GT2, 2014 GTLM

Mario Farnbacher – (2) 2015 GTD, 2017 GTD

Scott Sharp – (1) 2016 P/Overall

Ryan Dalziel – (1) 2012 WEC P2

Christian Fittipaldi – (1) 2015 P/Overall

Dane Cameron – (1) 2011 LMPC

Ricky Taylor – (1) 2017 P/Overall

Jordan Taylor – (1) 2017 P/Overall

Ryan Hunter Reay – (1) 2011 P2

Johannes van Overbeek – (1) 2016 P/Overall

Pipo Derani – (1) 2016 P/Overall

Nicolas Lapierre – (1) 2011 P1/Overall

Pato O’Ward – (1) 2017 PC

James French – (1) 2017 PC

Kyle Masson – (1) 2017 PC

Romain Dumas – (1) 2008 P2/Overall

Oliver Jarvis – (1) 2013 P1/Overall

Richard Westbrook – (1) 2013 GT

Ben Keating – (1) 2017 GTD

John Potter – (1) 2014 GTD

Andy Lally – (1) 2014 GTD

Christina Nielsen – (1) 2016 GTD

Cooper MacNeil – (1) 2013 GTC

Alessandro Balzan – (1) 2016 GTD

Townsend Bell – (1) 2012 GTC

Bill Sweedler – (1) 2012 GTC

Tim Pappas – (1) 2011 GTC

Previous Pole Winners (17)

Bill Auberlen – (4) 1994 GTU, 1997 GTS-3, 1998 GT3, 2016 GTLM

Olivier Pla – (3) 2012 WEC P2, 2015 P, 2016 P

Oliver Gavin – (3) 2001 GTS, 2003 GTS, 2009 GT1

Dane Cameron – (2) 2011 LMPC, 2014 GTD

Colin Braun – (2) 2013 LMPC, 2016 PC

Jan Magnussen – (2) 2007 GT1, 2012 ALMS GT

Ryan Briscoe – (2) 2013 P2, 2017 GTLM

Gustavo Yacaman – (1) 2017 PC

Tristan Vautier – (1) 2017 GTD

Dirk Mueller – (1) 2000 GT

Sebastien Bourdais – (1) 2014 P

Scott Dixon – (1) 2009 P1

Jeroen Bleekemolen – (1) 2015 GTD

Andy Lally – (1) 2013 GTC

Pedro Lamy – (1) 2006 GT1

Gunnar Jeannette – (1) 2010 LMPC

Joerg Bergmeister – (1) 2010 GT2

Previous Race-Winning Teams (16)

Corvette Racing – (11) 2002 GTS, 2003 GTS, 2004 GTS, 2006 GT1, 2007 GT1, 2008 GT1, 2009 GT1, 2013 GT, 2015 GTLM, 2016 GTLM, 2017 GTLM

Joest Racing (Now known as Mazda Team Joest) – (4) 2003 LMP900, 2009 P1, 2102 WEC P1, 2013 P1

Penske Racing (Now known as Acura Team Penske) – (4) 1964 Proto 15 (P 5000+), 1966 GT13 (GT 5000+), 1968 Trans-Am, 2008 P2/Overall

CORE autosport – (3) 2012 LMPC, 2014 PC, 2014 PC

BMW Team RLL – (2) 2011 GT, 2012 ALMS GT

AFS/PR1 Mathiasen Motorsports – (2) 2013 LMPC, 2015 PC

Risi Competizione – (3) 2007 GT3, 2009 GT2, 2010 GT2

Action Express Racing – (1) 2015 P/Overall

Tequila Patrón ESM – (1) 2016 P/Overall

Ford Chip Ganassi Racing – (1) 2014 P/Overall

Magnus Racing – (1) 2014 GTD

Performance Tech Motorsports – (1) 2017 PC

Porsche GT Team – (1) 2014 GTLM

Riley Motorsports/Team AMG – (1) 2017 GTD

Scuderia Corsa – (1) 2016 GTD

Wayne Taylor Racing – (1) 2017 P/Overall

Previous Race-Winning Manufacturers

Porsche – 94

Chevrolet – 40

Ferrari – 37

Mazda – 13

Audi – 12

Nissan – 11

Ford – 9

BMW – 7

Acura – 3

Mercedes – 2

Cadillac – 1