World Challenge Team News - Kinetic BMW Team Looks For Good Result At VIR

May 13, 2011 – BUFORD, GEORGIA …Kinetic Motorsports and Kinetic BMW M3 E92 drivers Jade Buford and Bryan Sellers are looking forward to another shot at showing off their car and their talents at the Bosch Engineering 200 at Virginia International Raceway in the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge on Saturday, May 14 at 11:15am ET. The Bosch Engineering 200 will feature the two drivers in the #33 Kinetic Motorsports BMW sponsored by Sail Air Travel, Inc. and Vion Hitachi Data Systems in the Grand Sport (GS) class. The team has high expectations for the race at VIR. Despite getting placed at the back of the field after a great qualifying run at Barber by Jade Buford, and having issues during a long pit stop, the driving duo still had a great run at Barber.

“Kinetic has spent considerable time going over what went wrong on our pit stop at Barber. It was not a great weekend for us or for our drive rs,” said Russell Smith, team owner of Kinetic Motorsports. “We have put into place a number of pit lane set-up disciplines that should prevent errors on the team’s part like what happened at Barber.”

“I think Jade and Bryan stand a good chance of a podium at VIR,” continued Smith, who is based in Buford, Georgia. “They are both quick and when they get an opportunity they move fast to seize it. The BMW is always quick at VIR, and we look forward to a strong performance from both the drivers and the Kinetic Motorsports team.”

“I think the team has done a good job at going back and re-evaluating some of the problems we had at Barber,” said Bryan Sellers, co-driver of the #33 BMW. “We’re trying not only to improve the car but to improve the program as well to make sure issues don’t reoccur. We’re constantly building and moving forward and tough weekends like Barber can either make you better at the program or they can defeat you. Everyone wants to win, so that’s the right mindset and I think a lot has gone into preparing for the pit stops and preparing for the race so that we can get a good result at VIR.”

“VIR should fit the BMW a little bit better,” continued Sellers, who is looking forward to racing the high speed track at VIR. “Hopefully that adds to the run to begin with. It’s always good to go to a track that suits your car, as opposed to a place like Barber that didn’t suit our car very well. Hopefully that’s a contributing factor to begin with, and we also have to make sure that we have a good car from the start of the weekend. We really need to focus on our program and not everyone else’s and make sure that we’re the best that we can be, because ultimately that will lead us to where we need to be. That’s what we did at Barber and that needs to be our goal for Virginia also.”

“I don’t think there was really much we could have done about the Grand-Am ruling at Barber, but we’ve been working on some things to make sure we don’t have any issues within our own pit stops,” said Jade Buford, who had an excellent drive at Barber. “We’re definitely expecting a good finish at VIR; there’s no reason not to. Bryan and I are one of the best driver pairings in the series and the team is very capable of providing us with a car that can win it, and if not, a Top 5 would be great for us and for the team.”