AIM Autosport Qualifies Seventh For GP Of Miami

Homestead, March 4, 2011: AIM Autosport’s BMW-Riley #61 will start from seventh place in tomorrow’s Grand Prix of Miami at Homestead-Miami Speedway in south Florida. AIM is launching its 2011 Grand-Am season at the second race of the Grand-Am Rolex Sports Car Series presented by Crown Royal Cask No. 16, having missed the season opener at the end of January.

Further putting AIM behind the pack, the team missed winter test sessions—particularly important this year as the series has switched to Continental tires. While many teams logged important data with the new rubber, AIM fell behind and now faces a steep learning curve. A single-day test early this week helped, but was really just a drop in the bucket.

Today’s practice sessions allowed the team to gather more information, but set up changes before qualifying yielded little benefit. Qualifying driver, Mark Wilkins, managed a lap of 1m 14.535s around the 2.3 mile (3.7 km) 11-turn road course at an average speed of 111.089 mph (178.8 km/h), placing seventh.

“It has to work, we just have to keep digging,” said Mark’s co-driver, Burt Frisselle. “We’ve got a steep learning curve as we’re behind and the only way to catch up is keep working.”

“I think it comes down to sorting out how we use the tire,” Mark added. “The Continental tire is vastly different from what we’ve used for the last three years and we have to think vastly differently to get the best out of them. Other teams figured this out during winter testing and, like Burt said, we have to keep digging. We’re here to win and we have to keep pushing.”

“We missed testing,” offered team principal, Ian Willis. He smiled, shrugged and then resumed pouring through the car’s telemetry, looking for the vital data that may allow the team to unleash its car.

A 30-minute warm-up session tomorrow at 8:30 am will allow the team to make further evaluations. The Grand Prix of Miami, a 2h 45m race will start at noon. Coverage will be broadcast live on SPEED and MRN.