Team Hardpoint EBM Battles To Top 10 Finish At Watkins Glen in IMSA WeatherTech Championship Six Hour Race 28.06.2021: Rob Ferriol, Katherine Legge and Andrew Davis Fought For a Lead Lap, Tenth Place Finish in the No. 88 Richard Mille/GridRival Porsche 911 GT3 R

Rob Ferriol, Katherine Legge and Andrew Davis Fought For a Lead Lap, Tenth Place Finish in the No. 88 Richard Mille/GridRival Porsche 911 GT3 R

 

Team Hardpoint EBM continued to improve the No. 88 Richard Mille/GridRival Porsche 911 GT3 R throughout Sunday’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen at Watkins Glen International, and at the end drivers Rob Ferriol, Katherine Legge and Andrew Davis scored a tenth-place finish for the team.



The race result came down to the final 37-minute sprint to the finish with Legge behind the wheel. A perfectly executed pit stop timed for fuel and left-side tires allowed her to jump two cars that had been quicker on track. Legge continued that battle through a difficult final run, matching pace with the best GT drivers in the championship.



The endurance racing finish is the starting point for the two-hour and 40-minute sprint race in just five days, again at Watkins Glen on Friday, July 2.



“I’m proud of the team,” Legge said. “They didn’t make any mistakes. We’ve got a little bit of work to do on the car for next week. We had moments where we were pretty strong and we could fight them at the end. We finished and we learned a lot and we’ll move on to the next one.”



Team owner Ferriol opened the race with a solid one hour, 50-minute double stint that kept the team in the top 10 from its original 13th place starting position. In addition to the springboard to Friday’s sprint race, the solid finish was a rebound from an early-race incident at Detroit.



“Six hours is a long race,” Ferriol said. “To finish any of these endurance races is a win. We finished in the top 10. We would have liked to have been in the top five but I’m sure everyone else would have as well. We had a good car to compete and finish the race. We still have some work to do to get it up to the sharp end of the field. But coming off the disappointment that we had at Detroit, I’ll take it and we’ll look forward to the sprint race this weekend.”

 


Davis joined Team Hardpoint EBM for endurance races for its inaugural 2020 season, and returned this weekend at Watkins Glen. Davis drove a two-hour, one-minute stint and handed the Porsche to Legge on the lead lap with a chance to compete at the finish, filling his role on the team perfectly.



“This team fights so hard, and we had a really good race in the pits, the strategy on track, and no mistakes, but it’s just such a competitive series here that you have to be perfect and be up there,” Davis said. “We were lacking just a little bit of pace, but not for a lack of effort. They don’t have to find very much for the next race coming up next weekend here to put Rob and Katherine up top.



I’m just really happy with the effort, and the team is so welcoming having me come in. I was just playing a support rule and did my stints through the middle and tried to save some fuel and take some heat off of both Rob and Katherine so she could show what she could do there at the end. And she did, fighting really hard with some of the best drivers in the world.”



Team Hardpoint EBM has a quick turnaround before Friday’s evening sprint race at Watkins Glen. Practice begins on Thursday with a one-hour session, followed by qualifying later that day at 5:40 p.m. Friday’s race begins at 6:10 p.m. EDT and can be seen live on NBCSN or via TrackPass on the NBC Sports app.

 




Reece White, Sideline Sports Photography