Lone Star Racing’s Rui Andrade told MotorsportWeek.com that he believes the late-change Balance of Performance power increase to the Mercedes-AMG GT3 was warranted, based on their lack of pace in the qualifying session for the Daytona 24 Hours, the traditional season opener for the IMSA WeatherTech Sportscar Championship.
When speaking to MotorsportWeek.com, the Angolan driver described how their turbocharged rivals can mask the potential of their powertrains.
“You can hide the pace of the car by reducing the pressure of the turbo, and you can obviously hide a little bit of the engine power there.
“And we knew right from the get-go that the restrictor and the weight added to the Mercedes would have kind of put us out of the window, and thankfully IMSA could see it on the pace that we were not in a very competitive window.”
Andrade will drive the #80 Lone Star Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 alongside Salih Yoluc, Adsam Christodoulou, and Scott Andrews. Christodoulou found qualifying challenging, with the #80 Mercedes-AMG starting fourth from last.
“We’ve done some long stints, especially doing a lot of double stints in the tyres, which this year will be mandatory compared to last year – whereas people could just go flat out with new tyres every stint,” Andrade continued.
“And the Mercedes is really good in the tyres, the brakes are really good – really consistent as well.”
The recent BoP change shows 15kg taken away for the Mercedes-AMG, even though it still weighs the most at 1375 kg. The next heaviest car is the Lexus RC F GT3, 5kg lighter, putting Mercedes-AMG on the back foot almost immediately.
Furthermore, the restrictor diameter was increased to 34.5, which is the smallest out of the GTD manufacturers, a reminder of one of the oldest GT cars in the field.
Andrade debuted in IMSA last year with an LMP2 campaign for Tower Motorsports, having completed an Endurance Cup campaign with them.
“I’m not coming in here as a complete rookie,” he said ahead of his second consecutive Daytona 24 Hours.
“I know more or less what to expect. The level of competition is just as high as it was before.
“But I also have more faith in my own skills and I have a lot of faith in my teammates in the car as well.
“So just overall much calmer than it was the first time.
And yeah, really excited to go racing and see what we can do.”
