Flying Lizard
Motorsport 2009 review
For Flying Lizard,
2009 will be a year to remember. The team swept all American Le Mans
Series GT2 titles: Jörg Bergmeister and Patrick Long won the
drivers’ championship in the No. 45 Porsche, Flying Lizard won the team
championship and the GT2 IMSA Cup (for the top privateer team), and the
No. 44 Porsche won the Michelin® Green X® Challenge.
The consistency of the team’s performance in the ALMS played a major
role in winning the championship. Still, it was a year of extreme highs
and lows. Among the high points, Bergmeister and Long won five ALMS
races in a row, setting the ALMS GT2 record for most consecutive race
wins with the same driver pair.
The lowest was undoubtedly the crash which totaled the Flying Lizard
No. 80 Porsche, putting an abrupt end to the team’s fifth 24 Heures du
Mans. (Thankfully, driver Darren Law walked away with only minor
injuries.)
Although the team had a rocky start to the ALMS season with a fourth
and fifth place at Sebring for the No. 45 and the No. 44, respectively,
things quickly turned around. Bergmeister and Long won the second race
of the season at St. Petersburg, putting them in the GT2 lead, which
they held through the rest of the season.
 The duo’s winning
streak continued for five races—adding Long Beach,
Utah, Lime Rock, and Mid-Ohio—and included two ALMS poles for
Bergmeister at Utah and Mid-Ohio. With a final win at Laguna Seca,
Bergmeister and Long won six of the 10 ALMS races in 2009.
Flying Lizard team manager Eric Ingraham reflected on the first pole of
the year at Miller Motorsports Park, “Utah was a singularly elegant
weekend, as close to a perfect weekend as you can get.
The No. 45’s performance was flawless: the Porsche was fastest in every
practice session, Jörg was on the pole, and he and Patrick led the
entire race. It was great to experience that level of racing where
everything works, all of the time, for all of the right reasons.”
After Utah, with a 14-point lead in the championship over drivers Jaime
Melo and Pierre Kaffer of the No. 62 Risi Competizione Ferrari, the
team headed to France for the 24 Heures du Mans with drivers Jörg
Bergmeister, Darren Law and Seth Neiman. All went well in practice and
qualifying for the trio, with Bergmeister starting on the GT2 pole, but
the No. 80 was retired after the early morning crash at hour 14, ending
the team’s hopes for a podium.
In their first year at Le Mans in 2005, Flying Lizard was on the podium
with a third-place finish, but has not finished higher than fourth
since. “We’ve always been quick and consistent at Le Mans, but just
have not had the results we wanted,” said team principal and driver
Seth Neiman. “Risi and Corvette Racing have shown consistent success at
long races like Le Mans, something we just haven’t achieved yet. One of
our objectives for 2010 is to step back and learn from our competitors
and really understand how to win in the major endurance events.”
After Le Mans, back in the U.S., the team regrouped and the No. 45 won
a fourth straight ALMS race at Lime Rock and then again at the
following race at Mid-Ohio. With four races to go in the season,
Bergmeister and Long now had a hefty 37-point lead in the GT2
championship over Melo and Kaffer. In the No. 44, Seth Neiman was sixth
in the drivers’ chase and co-drivers Darren Law and Johannes van
Overbeek were eighth and tenth, respectively.
Flying Lizard chief engineer Craig Watkins discussed the year, “For
Stefan Pfeiffer (No. 45 Porsche engineer) and me, the continuity of
having worked with Porsche and Michelin for so many years helped keep
things simple.
This year, all of the puzzle pieces came together: the Porsches were
extremely reliable, we understood the tires early in the season, the
crew did not make any mistakes, and the drivers were able to give us
directed feedback; collectively it all clicked.” However, by Road
America the GT2 field had changed significantly, reaching a level of
competition unprecedented in ALMS’ GT2 history.
The No. 3 and No. 4 Corvettes had now entered GT2 and already had one
successful race (and a podium) under their belts at Mid-Ohio. The Rahal
Letterman No. 90 and No. 92 BMWs had also sorted out the issues which
had dogged them early in the season. “In the first half of the season,
we were very competitive in terms of outright pace. We still had to
fight hard, but we started every race knowing we would be in the hunt
for the win,” added Seth. “By Road America, as a result of the new
entrants, and technical rules changes, we found ourselves at the back
of a very tough pack, fighting our hardest to be on or even near the
podium.”
At Road America, the Rahal Letterman BMWs took first and second—their
first win of the year—and the No. 3 Corvette had its second podium of
the year. The No. 45 was fourth and the No. 44 eighth. However, the No.
62 finished fifth, and the Lizards were still able to extend their
championship lead to 39 points.
“Competitively, it was very difficult,” continued Seth. “Rather than
fighting from a position of strength, we now found ourselves at the
other end of the performance spectrum. We had to dig deep and exploit
every possible area of advantage: relying on pit work, communication,
and consistency.
These areas have always been fundamental to our race program, but now
we had to deliver without the adrenaline that comes with fighting for
race wins. If we were to win the championship we could not afford a DNF
or a poor finish; we had to hang in there and make the right decisions
every single time and feel good about finishing fourth or fifth.”
After a tough race at Mosport, the No. 45 settled for fifth and the No.
44 was seventh. The No. 3 Corvette took their first GT2 win of the
season, the No. 62 finished second and the No. 4 Corvette finished
third. With two races to go, only two cars were still in contention for
the championship—the No. 45 and the No. 62—but the No. 45’s lead had
narrowed to 31 points.
Torrential rain during Petit Le Mans (which was scheduled as a 10-hour
or 1000-mile event) brought the race to a red-flag halt just before the
five-hour mark.
The field parked in pit lane, hoping for a restart, until race control
called the race due to rain at hour nine. Cars were awarded points
based on their position at the time of the red-flag: fifth for the No.
45 and seventh for the No. 44. The No. 62 won the race and the Lizard’s
lead narrowed to 19 points.
Chief strategist Thomas Blam discussed the incredible disappointment at
Petit, “The race was called at the point when we were most out of
sequence: just before the red flag, we were leading the race, then we
were fifth, then it was over. It left us all with a sense of unfinished
business. Had we had more running time, I think we had the car and the
team to finish on the podium.”
Returning back at their shop at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, California,
the Lizards prepared for the season finale Laguna Seca. In the
four-hour race, first place would earn 25 points: if the No. 45
finished tenth or better, the No. 45 and the team would still win the
championship, regardless of where the No. 62 finished. However, if the
No. 45 did not finish (did not complete 70 percent of the overall
leader’s race length, which is required to score points), and the No.
62 finished second or better, the No. 62 would take the title.
With a 19-point lead over Risi, the strategy for the No. 45 was to run
a conservative race and focus on bringing the car home. But though the
math was favorable, the team knew that racing conservatively can often
throw drivers and crews off their stride, and the championship was far
from guaranteed.
90 minutes into the race, the No. 62 was in the lead and the No. 45 was
running in third, when the No. 62 made contact with another car,
damaging the radiator. Facing a lengthy repair in the pits, the No. 62
retired from the race. With the championship secured, the No. 45 could
now race for the win.
By the halfway point, the No. 45 was in the GT2 lead. Over the last two
hours, first Long, and then Jörg battled to stay ahead the No. 3
Corvette in second. For the last 10 minutes, Jörg and Jan
Magnussen in the No. 3 were nose to tail, making contact in nearly
every corner and trading positions several times.
On the final lap, with the No. 45 leading, the two cars flew through
the final turn when the No. 3 Corvette made contact with the rear of
the No. 45, allowing him to get next to the No. 45 on the inside going
down the front straight. As they neared the finish line, the No. 3
pushed to overtake the No. 45 on the inside. The two cars made contact,
sending the No. 3 spinning across the track in front of the No. 45 with
a hard impact into the outside concrete wall. The No. 45 took the win,
with the No. 3 second.
The No. 44 finished fifth in GT2. Seth said, “The season finale at
Laguna Seca illustrates the extreme highs and lows of racing and how
quickly things can go from one to another. We won our second
championship mid-race, and that left the No. 45 free to push for the
win. Perfect pit work by the 45 crew put us in the lead, and great
driving by Patrick followed by a spectacular effort by Jörg in the
last 20 minutes allowed us to hold that position. Another handful of
championships, and a thrilling battle on track put us on top of the
world, only to fall hard with the frightening crash at the finish line.
That was terrible—we hated to see something like that happen.”
Following the accident at the finish line, IMSA, the sanctioning
organization of the American Le Mans Series, gave penalties to both
Jörg and Jan Magnussen. Seth added, “As a series, we need to find
the balance between hard racing, unfair racing, and dangerous racing.
We have always had the highest respect for the IMSA officials, and I
have no doubt they will tackle and resolve this issue in 2010.”
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Porsche won the manufacturers’
championship and the No. 45 brought home the 100th ALMS win for Porsche
at the season finale at Laguna Seca.
2009 was the Lizard’s sixth season with Porsche. “We have a great
relationship with Porsche,” added Seth. “Both of our organizations are
committed to doing what it takes to win and being competitive over the
long haul.
It was
the second ALMS GT2 championship title for Jörg and Patrick as
co-drivers, Jörg’s fourth ALMS championship and his second with
Flying
Lizard (he also win the 2008 title with co-driver Wolf Henzler in the
No. 45.)
“2009 is a racing year that I will never forget,” added Jörg. “We
had a
rough start at Sebring, but then to go on and win six races this season
was incredible. It was difficult after Mid-Ohio; there were too many
straights for us to be competitive against the BMWs and the Corvettes.
We had to stay calm and focused and not make any mistakes and
understand that that’s all we had to give at those races. Working with
the Lizards was truly an enjoyable experience—they are such a
professional group but also it’s almost like a family and everyone had
a part in winning the championship.”
For Patrick it was a rewarding end
to his first season back in GT2 after two years behind the wheel of
prototypes. He added, “The 2009 ALMS season was a roller coaster ride.
It really challenged our emotional stability.
When things were going
well, we had to avoid becoming complacent and overconfident. It was
also tough not to take any unnecessary risks, maybe not so hard when
things were going according to plan but on the days when things didn’t
play out as we had expected, that was tough.
No one could slip
up—either as a team or an individual. I’m so proud of the team that
over the entire season no one ever let this get to us.”
With their second consecutive championship wrapped up, the Lizards are
looking to the future. Late this year, the team will announce the
details of their 2010 racing program. They are planning on returning to
GT2 with Porsche and are gearing up for what will certainly be a tough
year.
We
are honest with each other about our strengths and weaknesses and that
allows us something that few of our competitors have—stability. In my
view, that’s how you get better: keep the situation stable so that you
can refine and learn.”
One third of the ALMS races next year are long distance races: 12 hours
at Sebring, six hours at Laguna and 10 at Petit Le Mans. “Our goal is
to win the 2010 GT2 championship and to win in GT2 at the 24 Heures du
Mans.
To do that, we need to improve our performance at the very long races.
We need to go into every race weekend knowing that our competitors do
something important better than we do. We need to find out what that
is, learn from them, and then try to do it better,” he added.
Looking to next year, Seth concluded, “The 2010 field will be brutal;
right now it looks like six or seven top-level cars supported by great
teams will be fighting for every win.
We’ve won two championships in a row and the target is on our back. We
thrive on the pressure; it will drive us to an even greater focus.
At the same time, we have to find a way to keep it fun. You can only
race well if you are truly exhilarated by it. That may well prove to be
the hardest part of 2010: keeping the level of enjoyment and
satisfaction in racing that’s required to win in the pressure cooker of
GT2.”
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