in New No. 80 ACS Manufacturing Mercedes-AMG GT3
Lone Star Racing Second Fastest in Thursday Afternoon Practice, Fourth in Morning Session in First Official IMSA Sessions in Mercedes-AMG GT3 for Dan Knox and Mike Skeen
Lone Star Racing team principal and driver Dan Knox, and his teammate Mike Skeen, shined Thursday in their first official IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship practice sessions at Circuit of The Americas (COTA) in the team’s new No. 80 ACS Manufacturing Mercedes-AMG GT3.
Making their 2017 season debut after last competing at Laguna Seca Raceway in October – a full six-months ago – Knox, Skeen and the Lone Star Racing team quickly showed that their off-season switch to the Mercedes-AMG GT3 was a smart move.
Trading off with Knox in both practice runs, Skeen set the No. 80’s fastest lap in Thursday morning’s first session, clocking in with a top lap time of 2:07.294.
Skeen improved to second fastest with a quick lap of 2:07.515 in Thursday’s afternoon session, which saw slightly slower times in total by the GTD field in hotter conditions.
Knox lapped two seconds quicker in the Mercedes-AMG GT3 than he did in the IMSA WeatherTech Championship race at COTA last September, in which he and Skeen co-drove to an eighth-place finish.
“It feels good to be back in a car and back at the race track with all of the other teams and drivers,” Knox said. “The Mercedes-AMG GT3 itself is much easier to drive than our old Viper was, it gives you a much more confident feeling, and it is showing in our times already.”
Skeen returns to Lone Star this season after partnering Knox at all four IMSA races in 2016.
“Obviously, it is always good when you can, in the first session and especially in a new car, run in the thick of the top five,” Skeen said. “We had pretty good speed right off the trailer, there’s still areas to work on, and we know the competition is going to bring up the pace too, but certainly a lot of promise. We seem to have a legitimate chance of doing well here. Dan has a pretty good amount of time on this track.”
Lone Star Racing Team Manager and Lead Engineer AJ Petersen led the off-season preparation of the No. 80 Mercedes-AMG GT3, which appeared to pay off today.
“First days, first weekends, they are always really tough,” Petersen said. “They can go perfectly and they can go not so perfectly, and we are in between. We are optimistic but we don’t want to be too optimistic. We don’t get trophies for the first day but we are starting well. The speed is there and the car has been reliable. Mercedes-AMG has been great to work with and we are pretty satisfied.”
Lone Star, which is headquartered at Motorsport Ranch, in Cresson, Texas, in the greater Dallas-Fort Worth area, took delivery of its new Mercedes-AMG GT3 late last year.
“We did some testing here at COTA a few weeks ago, and did a few small sessions back home at Motorsport Ranch, but that has been pretty much it,” Knox said. “We have customers and family and friends coming down to watch the race, but in some ways it is just another race weekend really. We are keeping our focus on the track.”
The IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race at COTA is scheduled to start at 2:35 p.m. CDT this Saturday, May 6. Live coverage and timing and scoring is available via IMSA.com and the IMSA mobile app.
Same-day television coverage of the race can be seen later on Saturday on FOX Sports 1 (FS1) at 7 p.m. EDT.
Noteworthy
- This weekend's IMSA WeatherTech Championship race at COTA is the first of four IMSA GT Daytona (GTD) races that Lone Star, Knox and Skeen will contest this year. The team also selected the three-race stretch of IMSA events at Road America, August 3 – 6, VIRginia International Raceway, August 25 – 27, and Laguna Seca, September 22 – 24. The four-race schedule includes the same four races that the team chose last year for its IMSA GTD racing schedule.
