No. 84 Porsche takes P2 in 991 GT3 R farewell race at Watkins Glen

It wasn’t a perfect race, but Fischer Motorsport and the two Porsche GT entries had plenty of reasons to smile about the overall outing in the 6 Hours of the Glen.

The weekend started off on a positive note already, as the No. 85 and No. 84 Porsche with drivers Stephen Nobes and Manuel Mayer qualified in second and third, respectively.

“That put everybody in a good state of mind, just a good mood really, overall.”, said team founder Benjamin Fischer.

Both cars ended up leading a total of 55 laps in the six-hour race, adding to the positive impression the organization left in the paddock at the classic American race track.

Unfortunately, because of a late crash and one-lap penalty for another incident, the No. 85 Porsche faltered to finish only P13, six laps down.

“Our result today doesn’t truly reflect our performance overall, I’d have to say.”, said Stephen Nobes.

“We led quite a few laps, were super strong on pace. I actually think we were the fastest car on track at times. This was super encouraging for us as a group. I know we had that crash late and the penalty and only finished P13. But I think we got a lot of positives to take away from this race.”

The No. 84 Porsche got punted into turn one by later race winners, the No. 151 BMW of World Of SimRacing Team, which the latter were penalized for by race control. But not even this incident stopped Jay Van Meppelen and Manuel Mayer.

The Canadian-German drivers duo clawed their way back to the leaders and were in contention for the win, closing the gap to the race winners to less than three seconds in the final laps, but ultimately ran out of time when the checkered flag waved.

“I feel like if we had another 3-4 laps, I might have got him (the 151)”, Van Meppelen argued in pit lane, after exiting the car.

“This was so much fun. I gotta tell you. It feels amazing, to be battling for wins. I’m hungry for more of this.”

The P2 finish earned the No. 84 Porsche a nice points payday, to move into sixth place in the VSCA SportsCar Championship standings with five races to go.

The No. 85 Porsche team falls further behind and will have to switch the focus on single race wins for the rest of the year, facing a massive 535-point deficit at the season’s halfway mark.

The next race in the VSCA SportsCar Championship is coming up on July 15th at the street course of Detroit Belle Isle.