The team avoided a myriad of incidents through the race to bring the No. 33 Ligier JS P217 home in eighth position
ELKHART LAKE, Wis. (August 4, 2024) – Sean Creech Motorsport continued to progress in its development of the reintroduced Ligier JS P217, finishing a solid eighth in Sunday’s IMSA SportsCar Weekend at Road America.
Drivers João Barbosa and Tonis Kasemets worked to keep the No. 33 Focal One Ligier out of trouble through five caution periods totaling 82 minutes in the two hour and 40-minutes race. Pacing as high as third on an outstanding strategy, the team added significantly to the car’s growing database.
Kasemets, the 2022 IMSA Prototype Challenge champion, joined the team on the weekend, subbing for Lance Willsey, who had family commitments. The longtime engineer for Pabst Racing in the USF Pro Championships junior formula ladder series, Kasemets brought that engineering background to play as he gave new insights to the team, joining veteran Barbosa in continuing the development efforts.
Through two 90-minute practice sessions, the SCM team worked to refine the Ligier JS P217’s setup – continuing to write the operational database for the reintroduced chassis. Both drivers worked closely with team engineers to improve handling in Road America’s tricky corners, and Kasemets left pit lane for Saturday’s 15-minute qualifying session with a setup that found the balance between corner handling and straight line speed. Kasemets’ time of 1:55.662 place the team in eighth position for the start of Sunday’s race – and validated all that hard work.
“The best thing about this team is that everyone – mechanics, engineers, drivers – we’re all pulling in the same direction,” said Kasemets. “We know we have a big task but everybody’s willing to do whatever it takes to find that next performance gain. That qualifying session is a testament to the fact that we keep pushing hard no matter what.”
Kasemets took the green flag but his attempt to make progress at the start was halted by a hip check in Turn 1 that sent him way wide through the corner. Recovering quickly – and with no damage – he continued on. By lap 10, he had radioed the team that “the car is good, very balanced.”
The team made a strategy call on an early yellow, bringing Kasemets into pit lane for fuel and an adjustment to the right front tire pressure.
Back out on track in seventh position, Kasemets was looking for more – until the No. 20 LMP2 put his nose inside in Turn 5, sending Kasemets into the gravel. In a bold move, Kasemets threw the Ligier into reverse, enabling himself to back into the runoff and continue, albeit now in 10th. He set about regaining those positions and handed the car to Barbosa with 76 minutes remaining.
Barbosa’s focus immediately became avoiding continuing incidents through the field and keeping the Ligier moving forward. The team hoped that a quick stop for fuel and tires with 40 minutes left would set him up to do just that.
With their competitors pitting with 25 minutes left, Barbosa took the restart in third position, and despite issues with the brakes – and getting hit several times – he brought the car home in eighth position, setting the team’s quickest race lap with a time of 1:55.940.
“I really took it at 90% at the start, as I knew there would be incidents and my job was to bring the car back to João the best I could,” said Kasemets. “Part of that was getting out of the gravel – I know the team didn’t really want me to use reverse, but there was a curb forward so that was the only way! It was a good weekend – I still love driving race cars and I really appreciate the opportunity to work with the SCM team.”
“Overall P8 is quite positive,” said Barbosa. “We were able to fight with the other LMP2 cars, though we were down a bit on straight line speed. But I’m happy with the result. The pace improved throughout the weekend, with the team finding little things that could make the car work better. We have a much better baseline to start with going forward, something we can really build on.”
Team principal Sean Creech was quick to commend the team’s effort throughout the weekend, and especially through Sunday’s race.
“Once again, this team showed that it has no quit,” said Creech. “They never gave up working on the car, figuring out how to make it work better. We’ve made significant gains this weekend and we’re happy with how far we’ve come. The strategy today worked out well, to get us in the top three, and we know we have what it takes to keep pushing the Ligier and making it better and better.”
SCM thanks partner Focal One for its continued support.
Next up for SCM will be the six-hour TireRack.com Battle on the Bricks at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, September 19-22. The race will be broadcast in its entirety on Peacock, with the final three hours on NBC. International viewers can watch via IMSA.tv, with IMSA Radio also available at IMSA.com.
About SCM
Team leader Sean Creech has competed in a multitude of sports car series from 1988 until the present day, including Group C, IMSA GTP, WSC, Grand-Am, SRO World Challenge, and IMSA. SCM will contest the full WeatherTech SportsCar Championship in 2024 with João Barbosa and Lance Willsey. http://seancreechmotorsport.com/
About Focal One
One in eight men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer during their lifetime in the United States. The Focal One® HIFU Prostate treatment offers patients a non-invasive outpatient procedure to target prostate tissue while avoiding the common side effects such as loss of urinary continence and sexual function. The Focal One treatment uses high-performance, high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) to precisely target and ablate the prostate, allowing patients to quickly return to normal activities. http://www.focalone.com/
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