Bryan Sellers: Precise Carelessness at COTA

Falken Tire Driver Instructs You Through the TUDOR Championship’s Best Corners

Austin, Texas, September 14, 2015 – Precise carelessness. These words might seem to be an oxymoron but Bryan Sellers uses them to perfectly describe his favorite set of corners at the Circuit Of The Americas (COTA). The Austin, Texas-area road course is the site of the September 19 Lone Star Le Mans – the second to last round of TUDOR United SportsCar Championship – in which the Braselton, Georgia-resident will attempt to win his second GT Le Mans (GTLM) class race of 2015. Sellers will again join longtime teammate Wolf Henzler (Germany) in the No. 17 Team Falken Tire Porsche 911 RSR on the 3.4-mile, 20-turn circuit. The pairing, now in its seventh season together, won earlier this year at Watkins Glen International and is a three-time defending class winner at the season finale Petit Le Mans scheduled for October 3 at Road Atlanta.

Drive-Through the Circuit Of The Americas Turns 2-6 with Bryan Sellers: “When they built COTA they looked at the best tracks in the world and brought aspect of them to Texas. When faced with choosing one from that list, I just can’t do it. Turn 1 might be the most famous at COTA, and for good reason, it is visually impressive when you watch the uphill blast into the tight left at the top. But, technically, it isn’t all that challenging. Where Turn 1 is important is when you leave it for a full-throttle attack of the next series of corners. So, my favorite ‘corner’ in Austin is more than just a single turn, it’s a section of corners: Turns 2 through 6.

The sweeping right of Turn 2 followed by the ‘esses’ that make Turns 3-5 and the harder right of Turn 6 is a very high-speed section of the track that requires a lot of technicality and precision combined with a little carelessness. This section is done in a progression of gears starting with Turn 2 being full throttle in fifth-gear. From there, it is a series of down shifts all the way down to third-gear for Turn 6. What makes this section so difficult is that you have to get it correct from the very beginning or there is no recovering. It has to be a rhythm that you cannot get wrong. The section is also quite important for lap time. If you get this sequence right the time can appear on the stopwatch. Get it wrong and it is nearly impossible to recover. Get it wrong multiple times and you won’t be coming back from it even in the two-hours and 40-minutes we will be racing in the Team Falken Tire Porsche 911 RSR!”

Saturday’s Lone Star Le Mans will be televised live at Noon Eastern Standard Time (EST) on FOX Sports 2. FOX Sports 1 will replay the race on Sunday, September 20, starting at 1:30 p.m. EST. IMSA.com will provide audio coverage of every on-track lap, including practice and qualifying while video streaming of qualifying will be available on the IMSA web site beginning at 4:45 p.m., Friday, September 18. The weekend’s activities can be followed on Twitter with the hash tag #LoneStarLeMans.

Want to learn more about the “behind the scenes” world of professional sports car racing? Be sure to check out Bryan’s blog at www.FlatSixes.com . The regular feature of the longtime Falken Tire factory driver shows various aspects of what it takes to succeed in endurance GT racing. The most current blog gives a detailed breakdown of the steering wheel used in the Falken Tire Porsche 911 RSR. http://flatsixes.com/porsche-motorsports/heres-what-all-the-buttons-on-the-porsche-911-rsr-control/ .

For more on Bryan Sellers, please visit him on the web at "> www.BryanSellersRacing.com . Follow Bryan on Twitter ("> www.Twitter.com/BryanSellers ) and LIKE him on Facebook at: www.facebook.com/BryanSellersRacing . Tune-in to Bryan’s YouTube channel at http://www.youtube.com/BryanSellersRacing .

Visit www.FalkenTire.com for more on Team Falken Tire.

Learn more about the TUDOR SportsCar Championship, please visit www.IMSA.com .

091415