Sixth Row Start for Tim Bell at Homestead

Sixth Row Start for Tim Bell at Homestead

Contact: Matt Cleary
Media
317-908-2975

MIAMI (4 March 2011) – There are a lot of lessons that race drivers have to learn along the way to success, and even though Tim Bell is making just his second-ever pro start, he’ll surely learn a lot this weekend at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Following a promoter test day on Thursday, the pace quickened as a pair of practice sessions set the tone for the final session of the day and the 15-minute qualifying session.

Once again sharing the No.14 BMW 128i with co-driver BJ Zacharias, Bell took to the track for qualifying with a less-than-ideal handling BMW for Doran Racing. But Bell tightened his belts and dug deep to get the most speed out of the BMW despite having to work with a car that is recalcitrant to turn.

“It was pretty good for the most part,” said Bell of the session. “I had fun playing around with that Porsche during the qualifying session. The biggest problem right now is the diff – it keeps locking up – to the point where I couldn’t even turn into the pits! It was pushing pretty bad through most of the infield. We’re getting a little bit more straight line speed, since the diff’s locked, we can get on the power sooner.”

The 2.5-hour race marks round 2 of the 2011 championship and will be broadcast on Speed March 19th (2:00 PM ET). Despite the quick 1:32.930-second lap of the track on Friday, Bell is hoping to find more speed and better fortunes on Friday.

“The team is pulling the diff right now and hopefully putting a new diff in and we’ll see how it goes in tomorrow’s practice,” said Bell. “Right now, it’s not really race-ready but if we can get different brake pads and a different diff then I think we can move up and we should be pretty good. It hasn’t gone exactly as planned so far, but we still have the race tomorrow and hopefully we can have another solid day.”

The race will air March 19 at 2:00 PM (ET) on SPEED.

–ends

Matt Cleary
Sunday Group Management
media
http://www.sundaymanagement.com
317.908.2975 (m)


Based in Indianapolis, Sunday Group Management is a leading motorsports management and communications consulting firm.

Sunday Group Management works with clients in a variety of motorsports categories, including NASCAR Sprint Cup driver AJ Allmendinger, Riley Technologies, GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series organization Michael Shank Racing, Continental Tire, and several teams and drivers in Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge competition.

For additional information: www.sundaymanagement.com, https://sundaygroupblog.wordpress.com, www.facebook.com/sundaygroup, or twitter.com/Sundaygroup