The No. 96 BMW M6 GTD class entry of Turner Motorsport finished 13th in the 67th running of the 12 Hour of Sebring on the 3.74-mile 17-turn historic Sebring International Raceway.
Round 2 of the WeatherTech SportsCar Championship began right where round 1 in Daytona left off with heavy rain and a treacherous track. Robby Foley took the start of the race under yellow from second position following the impressive qualifying session on Friday narrowly missing the pole.
Both co-drivers Bill Auberlen and Dillon Machavern cycled through to complete strong stints in the rain to hold top-five positions.
“I can’t emphasize enough how much of a complete package our BMW was this weekend,” said Robby Foley. “Qualifying went well allowing us to start from the front in today’s race and stay there for a significant amount of the race.”
Foley continued, “We had a solid shot at doing well here, we just were not able to make our time back in the end.”
As the track dried the Turner BMW M6 GT3 settled into a quick and consistent rhythm with all three drivers completing stints to work the blue and yellow BMW up and into the top three. Auberlen worked hard to chase down the GTD leader until damage to the left ront suspension forced him into pit lane for repairs.
The crew completed a repair on pit lane causing the No. 96 BMW to fall from second position to eleventh, 2 laps down from the GTD leader.
Machavern continued in his final stint with his best lap times of the race in an effort to make up as much ground as possible.
“The team worked hard to put a strong car under us for this race, it was a really fun car to drive,” said Dillon Machavern. “I’m happy with how we performed but disappointed that we couldn’t fight for it in the end as we had hoped.”
Foley completed his final run with a solid closing stint before handing the car over to Auberlen to finish up the final two hours following a routine front brake change which the team completed in under 1:47 seconds.
“We really had an amazing car today,” commented Bill Auberlen. “The entire Turner team worked hard to give us a BMW that handled, braked, and put power down extremely well. We were running a solid race until we ran into a little trouble with front suspension damage. Thanks to BMW and all our other supporters for all the help this weekend.”
Ultimately the No. 96 BMW of Turner Motorsport placed 13th at the 12 hour mark to round out the second round of the 2019 season.
“Thank you to all our sponsors, BMW North America, my crew and all our fans and supporters out there,” said Will Turner. “It’s amazing to have all this support every weekend, BMW race fans are the best! Despite not finishing where we had wanted, we had a very successful weekend and we are looking forward to the next one.”
The team will have another break before resuming racing action in round 3 at Mid-Ohio SportsCar Course on May 3rd-5th.
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