Marcelli Sebring race report

AFTER RACING TO THE FRONT, SEBRING ENDS EARLY FOR MARCELLI.

#8 Merchant Services Racing Oreca FLM09: Kyle Marcelli, Lucas Downs, Dean Stirling

Photo by: Alexander Trienitz

(Sebring, Florida) March 21st 2012 – It was not the way Merchant Services Racing driver Kyle Marcelli wanted to kick off his 2012 American Le Mans Series campaign. After being signed to the newly formed team less than four weeks ago, the 22-­-year old Canadian race driver was opted by the team to drive the first stint and take the green flag at the 60th Anniversary Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring.

After starting 8th on the grid, Marcelli raced to the front where he positioned the #8 Merchant Services Racing LMPC 2nd place in class for the first hour of the race. After starting with such promise, it was about three laps until the teams first scheduled pit stop when Marcelli suffered a broken steering rack at the apex of the extremely fast and bumpy turn one. Marcelli limped the car back to pit-­-lane where the experienced crew took the car behind the wall for repair.

Loosing little time, the team had replaced the damaged steering rack and Marcelli returned to the track to test the repair. After a quick two lap’s around the 3.7-­-mile circuit, Marcelli concluded that everything was ok and made a scheduled pit stop to get co-­-driver Dean Stirling behind the wheel.

After completing only about five laps, Stirling unfortunately found himself in the wrong place at the wrong time as two GT cars made contact in front of him in turn seventeen. With little time to react and no where to go, Dean had made contact which ended the race and any chance of victory for the #8 Merchant Services Racing LMPC driven by Kyle Marcelli, Lucas Downs and Dean Stirling.

“The team had been working around the clock the last four-­-weeks since the launch of Merchant Services Racing. Following the announcement of the driver line-­-up, everyone was eager to get the program underway. Our Sebring result was in no way a reflection of the teams preparation, hard work and passion. It was simply circumstances out of anyone’s control that put us out. It’s a shame to start the season with zero points but I know it’s made everyone more hungry for victory in Long Beach. ” Said Merchant Services Racing Driver Kyle Marcelli.