Posted (12/21/2006) -
On November 6th and 7th, Team Sahlen did a test at Daytona International Speedway with the ROLEX Series. The team will be competing in the Grand Touring (GT) Class of the Great American ROLEX series with custom Corvette race cars.
For practice purposes, the team has been driving two previously owned Pontiac GTOs and a previously owned Chevrolet Corvette to get a similar feel of what the brand new custom built Hoerr GBM Corvettes will be like come race day to start the 2007 season. During the two day test, the cars ran fine and further helped drivers Joe Sahlen, Joe Nonnamaker, Wayne Nonnamaker and Will Nonnamaker get more comfortable with the V8 engine and tube framing of General Motors cars. While the cars ran fine, the team is looking forward to getting their new Corvettes because the GBM technology will give them the technology they need to compete.
Along with the three GM machines, the team also brought with them a Porsche 996 which they anticipate to have a strong showing at Daytona's 24-hour race.
While it was crucial that the team was able to practice with the GTOs, the Porsche was the real test for the team down in Daytona. They were able to test the newest developments they have for the car on the track it'll be racing on.
And when they tested the Porsche 993 GT3, it had the fastest test session out of all the Porsche 996s tested those days. "We are very happy with the development of our Porsche. This car is going to be a strong car to have in the 24-hour race at Daytona," said driver Will Nonnamaker.
And the speed and upcoming modifications on the Porsche aren't the only things working to the advantage of the team. As Nonnamaker points out, their Porsche is "one of the few cars in the field that will have ABS. This will be a strong advantage as the sun drops and conditions become more treacherous at night."
Despite the fastest test session, the team knows there is still some more development to do with the car, including replacing parts with carbon fiber replacements to get the car down to a minimum weight.
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