It was the season’s finale at the USA’s legendary Petit Le Mans on Mario Farnbacher’s agenda. The top-class IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship finale saw the Franconian driving an Aston Martin Vantage GT3 from Heart of Racing together with works driver Marco Sörensen and the Canadian Zacharie Robichon.
“Our aim was to drive a clean race and end it in a good position,” the two-time GTD champion of the IMSA Championship explained. “I tried to learn as much as possible in the car every time. Our fourth place meant we achieved a good result!”
The trio began the ten-hour race on the Road Atlanta from eighth on the grid of the competitive class. A sound strategy and a good driving performance enabled the pilots to gain several places with the Aston Martin. Remarkably enough, the race proceeded basically without any particular incidents – this wasn’t to be expected with the large contestant field on the natural terrain track, so an error-free accomplishment was all the more important.
Focus of the Heart of Racing team was on the title fight of team colleague Ross Gunn in the sister car #23. Farnbacher had already been able to support him during the season. In the end, the British Aston Martin works driver missed the title by a mere four points!
Farnbacher summarised, “I think we did all we could to support #23 in the GTD Pro class title fight. It’s a pity it wasn’t enough for the title, but I’m sure #23 and#27 had a fantastic fight!”
Mario Farnbacher will now be preparing himself as well as possible for the new season. Let’s see what 2025 has in store.
