Bolingbrook, Ill, (May 2, 2017) - WeatherTech Racing drivers Cooper MacNeil (Hinsdale, Ill.) and Gunnar Jeannette (Salt Lake City, Utah) are heading to the IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship Advanced Auto Parts Sports Car Showdown at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) May 4-6, with momentum from their Long Beach win.
MacNeil and Jeannette won the GTD Class race at Long Beach. The duo also combined to take the class win (third overall) in the Tour Auto rally in France last weekend. Combined with the Riley Motorsports team they will have to adapt the Mercedes-AMG GT3 car to the 3.2-mile, 20-turn undulating natural terrain COTA road course.
"I think our Mercedes will perform well at COTA," MacNeil said. "We have a bit of a smaller air inlet restrictor since we raced at Sebring, which could come into play. The Riley guys have been working hard since Long Beach and I am looking forward to giving them another strong result. My favorite section of the track at COTA is the esses. I am expecting them to feel magical in our Mercedes."
The duo drove a 1974 Porsche 911 RSR 3L through the country side of France that combined timed stages and road driving.
"Gunnar and I are on a roll now with our win at Long Beach and our class win [third overall] at the Tour Auto rally last week in France. We hope to use that momentum to score a strong result at COTA on Saturday."
"Our Mercedes-AMG GT3 should be well suited to Circuit of The Americas" Jeannette said. "The higher speed nature of the track and need to use the curbing aggressively in every corner should play to our strong points. That being said, I think the competition again will be very close. I have had a great last couple of weeks winning Long Beach with WeatherTech Racing, followed by winning a historic event at Road Atlanta in a Lola LMP1 car, then spending a great week over in France with Cooper in their 1974 Porsche RSR. I'm hoping to continue a nice string of finishes at COTA this weekend, but it certainly isn't easy in IMSA competition at the moment. When you do well it does make for better memories though!"
The IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship Advanced Auto Parts Sports Car Show Down will be televised Saturday on FOX Sports 1, Saturday, May 6 at 7:00 p.m. ET.
