Petersen/ White Lightning Rolls Into France For Le Mans

Petersen/ White Lightning Rolls Into France For Le Mans

 

LE MANS, France, June 7, 2004 – 60 years ago, Allied troops stormed the
beaches at Normandy in the culmination of a year’s planning and
preparation to liberate France. While Petersen Motorsports/ White
Lightning Racing’s return to Europe for this week’s 24 Heures Du Mans
does not pretend to foreshadow a turning point in world affairs, it does
bring to fruition the Las Vegas-based race team’s strategy. With a LM GT
class victory earned in cooperation with Alex Job Racing under their
belt, team owner Mike Petersen and team manager/ entrant Dale White
began assembling the ingredients to bring their own, full program to the
Le Mans while standing in victory lane celebrating the 2003 victory. The
year of planning began to pay-off in April as the No. 90 Westward Ho
Casino/ MMPIE/ PAWS/ mail2web.com Porsche 911 GT3 RSR driven by Jörg
Bergmeister (Langenfield, Germany), Patrick Long (Oak Park, Calif.) and
Sascha Maassen (Raeren, Belgium) obliterated the old track record (set
the previous year by the Petersen-owned Porsche) in pre-qualifying for
the 72nd Annual race around the clock. 

 

Petersen/ White Lightning now returns to 8.6-mile Circuit Des 24 Heures
Du Mans as one of the favorites to win the pole position and the June
12-13th race. To prepare for the grueling 24 hour event, Petersen/ White
Lightning— who finished third in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS)
season-opening Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring in March— put the 2004
Porsche 911 GT3 RSR under a rigorous rebuild in the month between
testing and Wednesday’s first day of on-track practice. The beautifully
prepared Petersen Porsche was sent to the Porsche race factory in
Weissach, Germany where every component was removed, checked and then
replaced with a new component by the Petersen/ White Lightning crew. 

 

The No. 90 underwent a thorough technical inspection in the center of
the city of Le Mans this afternoon. With the successful completion of
Automobile Club De l’Ouest (ACO) scrutineering, the car received its
final inspection sticker and permission to begin practice and
qualifying. 

 

Mike Petersen, team owner/ driver: “We’re all excited about being here
the second time at Le Mans. It was very important for me to try and
duplicate our awesome finish here with our team. It’s been several years
planning for this and to attempt to win Le Mans with my own team has
been a goal of mine since I was a little boy. We’ve added some good new
people to the team. We have a very good organizational gentleman by the
name of Stephan [Pfeiffer, crew chief] and we have a lot of the same
guys returning. I feel this is one of the strongest racing teams in the
series in America and worldwide. I think we have the right combination
to compete at any level at any venue in the world. And I know everyone
is just as excited as I am with the way things are going. We can’t wait
until Saturday to start.”

 

For more, please visit www.petersenmotorsports.com.  

 

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Digital images and complete team and driver bios available upon request.

Editors, please do not publish any contact information other than web
sites.  Thank you.

 

contact: Tom Moore, Petersen Motorsports/ White Lightning Racing,
615-778-1614 (office), 

404-229-3703 (cell), tom@darkhorsecom.com