Team press release
(Long Beach, California) April 17th 2012 – It was a street fight Saturday afternoon during the 38th Annual Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach as the American Le Mans Series Presented by Tequila Patron roared around the 1.9 mile temporary racing circuit in downtown Long Beach, California. Merchant Services Racing driver Kyle Marcelli and co-driver Anthony Downs raced to a 4th place finish in the LMPC category.
For the drivers of the American Le Mans Series, it was a race weekend that offered zero dry practice laps prior to taking the green flag for the two-hour sprint race.
Teams and drivers had a two-hour free practice session on Friday morning to learn the circuit and test set-ups. Unfortunately, it was under very wet conditions. For 22-year old Kyle Marcelli, he had no problems coming to grips with the circuit under the miserable conditions. Marcelli posted the fastest lap in the LMPC category which impressively was second fastest overall behind the Muscle Milk Honda LMP1 of Lucas Luhr and Klaus Graf.
“If you ask me, I rather enjoyed it.” Said the Canadian racer Kyle Marcelli. “I’ve driven many permanent road courses in wet conditions but never a temporary street circuit. The car was very good under braking and on turn-in, I suffered most just trying to get the power down as the car has no traction control.”
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