67 years to the month since the track hosted its inaugural race event, Rebel Rock Racing heads to Virginia International Racing for Round 8 of the 2024 IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge. Trailing the series lead by 400 points with a late-season title bid still mathematically a reality, the focus this weekend is to maximize whatever home field advantage there may be in Southern Virginia.
The team’s performance at Road America in Round 7 highlighted the obstacles any team faces when racing an entirely new platform for the first time. With no previous testing at the Wisconsin venue, fuel consumption data was limited and led to strategy calls being made on the fly. A position that Robin Liddell is very keen to ensure is not repeated this season. To that end the team based in Deland Florida has, this week, been running as many testing miles as possible at the seventeen turn, 3.270 mile natural terrain road course.
“This week was the first time we tested the 2024 AM GT4 Evo at Virginia International Raceway. We have certainly put in the laps in testing here over the last five years or so. The first time I raced at VIR was 2006 in a Porsche,” explained driver and Rebel Rock Team Manager, Robin Liddell.
The Scotsman went on to say that “eighteen years on, the Aston feels pretty good around here. In some places and needs a little work in others, your typical issues at VIR. We have areas where we can improve before the weekend but we are feeling a lot more confident having put in some solid testing miles this week.”
This is the home race for local resident and Team Owner, Frank DePew. The driver, originally from Richmond, has been racing at the track for more than two decades. “My first race at VIR was in 2002 in the inaugural year of the NASA Honda Challenge in my home-built Honda Civic DX hatch. I ran it with an Integra Type R motor in the H1 Class. I’ve loved the track ever since!”
He went to say “This week’s testing laps were our first test here in the 2024 Aston Martin Vantage GT4. We now go into the weekend with a greater level of comfort than we had at Road America and I am looking forward to the drop of the Green Flag on Saturday afternoon.”
The Green Flag for the Virginia is for Racing Lovers Grand Prix, Round 8 of the 2024 IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge at Road America drops at 2:15pm ET on Saturday, August 24th. The race is live on Peacock in the USA. For International viewers without a TV broadcaster, the race can be seen live at IMSA.TV. IMSA Radio will also have non-stop live coverage of the race. For full event coverage please follow Rebel Rock Racing on Twitter at @RebelRockRacing, on Instagram at @rebelrockracing and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/