Krohn Racing Captures Another Podium Finish

Mid-Ohio, June 20, 2009: The No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Lola of Nic Jönsson and Ricardo Zonta finished second in Saturday’s EMCO Gears Classic race at Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio. Krohn Racing’s podium finish was their second in less than a week, after team owner/driver Tracy W. Krohn, Eric van de Poele and Jönsson captured a third place finish in the Risi-Krohn Ferrari 430 GT at last weekend’s 24 Hours of Le Mans race in Le Mans, France.

Jönsson started the Proto-Auto Lola from the fifth position on the grid and climbed into the top three. He pitting on Lap 25 of the 111-lap race, to turn the wheel over to Zonta, who methodically worked his way up from the seventh position to give the team a second-place finish. Zonta gave eventual winner Scott Pruett a hard run for the final 40 laps. Pruett finished with just a 0.491 margin of victory over the former Formula One Brazilian hotshoe.

Nic Jönsson, driver, No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Lola: “We had a decent qualifying. We qualified fifth, although I think we could have been third. We had a good car from the beginning of the race. We got a lot of pick-up on the tires and it was almost impossible to drive for four or five laps. It was just holding on for life. Then the yellow came out and we had to do everything over again. It was a very rough first 45 minutes. I hung on and tried to keep the car up as high as possible. I handed it over to Ricardo in fifth. Ricardo got in and did an absolutely stunning job. He was in the car for a long time and it was hot in there. He did a fantastic job and kept plugging away. I think we had a decent race car. We still have a few more little things to do but the car is getting more competitive. It’s right there now. Again, I can’t say enough about Ricardo’s performance today. The Krohn team did an awesome job. The pit stops were flawless and the strategy was right on the money. I also want to give a big thanks to Tracy to give us this opportunity to be out there and run up front when he’s not able to be here. This second place today, following up the third place on the podium with Tracy and Eric (van de Poele) last week at Le Mans, feels really good. Hopefully we’ll have some more wins here in Grand-Am this year.”

Ricardo Zonta, driver, No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Lola: “The race was good. I didn’t have much time in the dry before jumping in the car for the race, so I had to get used to the car in the dry. The car was quite good, and the mechanics and the crew worked very well. The strategy worked very well so I am very happy about our result. I tried very hard to overtake Pruett at the end but we didn’t have enough speed on the straights, too much downforce. We couldn’t really battle Pruett because of that. If you just keep the car inside the corners you cannot overtake the other guy. The only place to pass was on the straights and we didn’t have the speed for it. It was good points for the team. Of course, there is not much chance for the championship anymore but I think if you keep it on the podium every race it would be very nice.”

Tracy W. Krohn, owner/ driver, Krohn Racing: “It really was a great race. We had a good chance of winning there at Mid-Ohio. My hat’s off to the Ganassi team. They had a good bit of luck with pit stops and yellows; otherwise we could have won the thing.

We are continuing to improve this car and running at the top of the field. We just need a little bit more out of the car and we’re going to be right there. The battle between Scott and Ricardo is what Grand-Am racing is all about! It was fun to watch. Ricardo stepped in there pretty hard a few times and with traffic. I was very impressed with the results. Pruett and Ricardo showed how to do it. That’s what you want -- guys battling it out wheel-to-wheel.

Nic had to deal with some funky tires at the beginning of the race and did so extremely well. He brought the car in at an opportune time and it worked out for us.

I’m ready to get back in the race car at the next event at Daytona and can’t wait to see everyone and get back at it.”

David Brown, Team Manager/Engineer, Krohn Racing: “We’re pleased with the results. It’s not often you can run the same times as the 01 car, and faster than the 99 car. The car was quick. I think the 01 car was possibly the only car quicker than us and very similar in times, which is, I think, a step forward for us. So we are quite pleased about that. Apart from the results, the fact that the car’s performance has increased to that level is good and we think we understand why, which is a nice thing. We’re quite encouraged by that.

We didn’t really have any major issues in the race. Nic got a lot of pickup on the tires at the beginning, along with everybody else. It took a long time to clean them up and they never really came in completely so we were quite keen to get those tires off the car and put a fresh set on. Pit stops were absolutely wonderful. We were running a bit warm once and we made a cooling change during a pit stop and it went very well.

The strategy really was that we sat in the factory before we left to come to the race and planned our strategy. Precise details like which lap we would stop on we had to decide at the time. The strategy itself was exactly what we had planned to do.”