Flying Lizard Motorsports announced today its driver lineup for Petit Le Mans, the 1,000-mile/10-hour flagship race of the American Le Mans Series season. In the No. 45 Porsche, Johannes van Overbeek and Joerg Bergmeister will be joined by Porsche factory driver Marc Lieb, reprising their lineup from the season-opener at Sebring in March in which they finished second in GT2. The lineup in the Flying Lizard No. 44 Porsche will be Seth Neiman, Darren Law, and Lonnie Pechnik.
With just two races to go in the season, van Overbeek and Bergmeister are in second place in the drivers' championship, 36 points behind Mika Salo and Jaime Melo in the No. 62 Risi Ferrari. The Flying Lizard team is also second in the ALMS team championship, 27 points behind Risi.
van Overbeek and Bergmeister have battled Salo and Melo over the year for the championship, taking the lead in midseason with two consecutive wins at Lime Rock and Mid-Ohio. However since Ohio, bad luck has dogged the No. 45 with the most recent incident at Detroit, when the No. 45 scored no points after being retired due to an accident and car fire. The No. 45 was rebuilt after Detroit using a new chassis and will be ready to race at Petit.
"We have our work cut out for us heading into Petit," said van Overbeek. "We're still in the hunt for the championship, but after the disappointing results from Mosport and Detroit, the gap between us and Risi has widened and it will take a lot for us to pull it out at this point."
Bergmeister, a four-time consecutive winner of the Petit Le Mans in the GT2 class, is looking forward to the race. "I've definitely had luck at Road Atlanta over the last four years. Hopefully some of that luck will carry forward for us! Petit is always a challenging race – it's a sprint that just happens to last 10 hours. You race here without holding anything back. On the other hand, the length of the race can work to your advantage and give you a chance to recover if there is a problem. We have a brand new car here so it's good that we have a long race week and lots of track time leading into the race to work on setup."
In the No. 44, Neiman, Law and Pechnik are running together again as a trio for the second time this year. The No. 44 Porsche is coming off of its second podium finish of the year at Detroit – where Law and Patrick Long finished second in GT2 – the highest finishing Porsche of the race.
Race Details
The Petit Le Mans begins at 11:15 a.m. ET on Saturday, October 6. SPEED will provide live coverage from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. and again from 6:30 to 10 p.m. American Le Mans Radio and IMSA Live Timing and Scoring will be available at americanlemans.com.
Fans can follow the Lizards' race progress through their live team radio transmissions and real-time race blog. Details at
www.lizardms.com.
Flying Lizard Announces Driver Lineup For Petit Le Mans 
