LEXINGTON, Ohio – Dempsey Racing’s Mazda RX-8 GTs and drivers Joe Foster, Charles Espenlaub, James Gué and Leh Keen head to Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course this week ready to kick-off the second half of the 2010 GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series season with a pair of positive results in Saturday’s EMCO Gears Classic.
Both the No. 40 Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8 GT of Foster and Espenlaub and the No. 41 Team Seattle/Global Diving/Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8 GT of Gué and Keen are coming off of strong showings two weeks ago in the Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen and head to a Mid-Ohio track that has been the site of some success for both the Dempsey team and its drivers. Espenlaub will team with Foster for the third consecutive race, filling-in for regular Dempsey Racing driver and team owner Patrick Dempsey who is currently filming a move in Louisiana. Last year Dempsey scored a personal career-best GT finish of sixth at Mid-Ohio co-driving the No. 40 Mazda with Foster.
“Patrick hates to miss any race, but Mid-Ohio was one he was really hoping to be able to make after doing so well last year,” Foster said. “He did a great job in the race and was even among the fastest drivers in practice in the dry and the rain, so this is a tough one to miss. But Charles always does a great job and our car showed some of its best pace of the season at The Glen even though I had a rare early spin in the wet that kept us from really being able to challenge up front. That bodes well for Mid-Ohio and we are looking forward to a great run in our Mazda.”
Foster and Espenlaub took the No. 40 Mazda to its second seventh-place finish of 2010 at The Glen to go along with March’s Grand Prix of Miami result. Those showings follow only the season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona where Scott Maxwell, Espenlaub and Foster all helped their teammate Dempsey score another sixth-place finish, Dempsey Racing’s best ever in the grueling Daytona opener.
While the No. 40 squad appears ready to join the ranks of leading contenders in the second half of the season, the No. 41 Mazda team is right on the brink of victory. The new-for-2010 team scored top-three podium finishes in half of the season’s first six races, including the last two rounds at The Glen and the Memorial Day Weekend Classic at Lime Rock Park where they earned third and Dempsey Racing career-best second place finishes, respectively. Gué and Keen first hit victory lane in just the No. 41 team’s second race together at Miami where they finished third.
“I am very pleased with how the first half of the year has gone,” Gué said. “We knew going into the year it was going to be tough, sort of getting all of the pieces together. We had all of the right people and the right equipment in place and it was just a matter of getting the continuity and the working relationships going. I wouldn’t say it exceeded my expectations, because I knew the potential was always there, and these last two races went very well. We have a lot of momentum behind us now and hopefully we can continue that right into Mid-Ohio.”
Keen hopes to continue at Mid-Ohio an impressive streak that has seen him win the last two GT races there. He co-drove to victory in both 2008 and last year, a pair of comeback wins after breaking his collarbone in a 2007 practice accident at Mid-Ohio.
“Mid-Ohio is a special place for me for sure,” Keen said. “I had a bad crash there in '07 and it took me out of the season. I missed three races after that but came back and won at Mid-Ohio in 2008 and then again won in '09 so it was a pretty cool rebound, really.”
Keen is also riding an amazing streak of results this year in international sports car racing competition. Last weekend he joined former GRAND-AM teammate Dominik Farnbacher for a second place GT2 class finish at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in France in a Farnbacher Racing Ferrari F430. He also joined the same Ferrari team for a class victory and second-place overall finish in May’s 24 Hours of Nurburgring in Germany. Combine those results with his Rolex Series GT accomplishments with Gué and the Team Seattle/Global Diving Mazda and Keen has made it to victory lane in his last four races and five on the season.
“The last month has been real blur,” said Keen, who also found the time in May to co-drive to victory in the classic One Lap of America competition. “Right now I am just back from Le Mans, just on a roll with two podiums in the last Rolex races and we came pretty close to winning at The Glen. I'm really thinking that we can win this Mid-Ohio race. We have done well there in the past and now we really have got our stuff together. It’s the second half of the season now, and so we are really going to have to turn it on and get as many points as we can possibly get so we can be there at the end of the championship run.”
The No. 41 Team Seattle/Global Diving/Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8 GT is currently third in the GRAND-AM Rolex Series GT Team Championship with 156 points while Gué and Keen rank fourth in the driver standings with the same points total. At 135 points, the No. 40 Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8 GT is tied for fifth in the team standings while Foster ranks seventh in the driver championship.
“To be honest, I haven’t really looked at the points,” Gué said. “I kind of take it race by race. Coming into this year, you always want to do well and win a championship, but really our goal was to get the team up and running and to be winning races by the second half of the year. These last two races we have been knocking on the door, and hopefully the victory is right around the corner. I just approach each race one at a time and we try and do the best we can and are certainly going for the win and if at the end of the year we end up on top in points, all the better.”
