BMW Team PTG Road America Test Notes

BMW Team PTG
Notes and Quotes
SCCA Pro Racing Speed GT Championship - Round 7
Test Day
Road America
Elkhart Lake, Wis.
Thursday, July 31, 2003
Race Date: Sunday, Aug. 3, 2003

Just four days after its historic 1-2-3-4 Speed GT Round-6 sweep at Infineon
Raceway in Sonoma, Calif., BMW Team PTG introduced its four BMW M3s to the
Road America circuit today for Round 7 of the SCCA Pro Racing Speed GT
Championship. 

Since the beginning of the current BMW M3 racing program in 1995, BMW Team
PTG has never raced at the 4.0-mile,
14-turn circuit in Elkhart Lake, Wis.

BMW took over the Speed GT Manufacturer's Championship lead after 1-2-5 and
1-3-4 finishes in Rounds 3 and 4 at Lime Rock Park in May. With his third
win of the season at Infineon, Bill Auberlen leads the Speed GT Driver's
Championship, so Team PTG was all business today, pushing hard to learn the
track in order to defend the championship standings.

Pushing a bit too hard, both Boris Said and Hans Stuck found the gravel trap
at Turn 14  and Justin Marks was forced into the team's spare car after
hitting the wall in Canada Corner (Turn 12).

Official practice for the weekend is scheduled for 1:15 p.m. CT tomorrow. A
second one-hour practice session is scheduled for 9:00 a.m. on Saturday,
followed by qualifying at 1:00 p.m. Sunday's race is scheduled to start at
11:20 a.m.

Speed Channel note: Last Sunday's Round 6 Speed GT race is scheduled to be
broadcast at 3:30 p.m. ET, Saturday, Aug. 2.

HANS STUCK, NO.8 BMW TEAM PTG M3:
"This is a track that requires everything from a car, with its slow corners,
second-gear corners, long corners, fast kinks and long straights. Road
America has three-quarters of what we want and one-quarter what we don't
want (the long straights). I am quite surprised that even though we are
maybe five miles per hour slower than most of our competitors on the
straights our lap times are not too bad. ON THE OFF-COURSE EXCURSION: "We
made many changes that kept improving the M3 so I kept pushing. Every lap
was faster until I tried one-10th of one percent more and I was off sideways
into the gravel. I am very lucky that we only have to spend time cleaning
the rocks from the car and not repairing it."

BORIS SAID, NO. 6 BMW TEAM PTG M3:
"The track feels great and we made a lot of progress on our car today." ON
THE OFF-COURSE:  "No big news - I tried something and got into the last
corner a little too hot. I locked up the rear brakes and spun out." ON THE
FAMOUS ROAD AMERICA FOOD: "I'm already four brats into the weekend."

BILL AUBERLEN, NO. 7 BMW TEAM PTG M3:
"Road America is a fantastic race track. We felt that we would not be as
competitive as we usually are because the M3 does not have nearly as large
an engine as our competitors, so we have to make up our lap times in the
corners and this circuit has very long straights. Team PTG has built great
M3s and knows how to prepare them so I am cautiously optimistic now that we
have actually made some laps."

JUSTIN MARKS, NO. 80 BMW TEAM PTG M3:
"Today was one of those unfortunate racing days when you have an accident.
The good news is that Team PTG is a first-class operation and has a spare
M3. Racing is always a challenge and now I am looking forward to rising to
the occasion."

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