MONTEREY, CA (Sunday, May 14, 2023) — The Paul Miller Racing team struggled today, mustering just a 10th place finish in a scrappy Course de Monterey race at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca.
Starting P5 aboard the No. 1 Quartz Engine Oil-backed BMW M4 GT3 machine, Madison Snow worked his way into podium contention in the yellow flag-marred first 90 minutes of the two-hour, 40-minute event.
However, with longer green flag runs in the final stint of the race—with Bryan Sellers then at the helm—the notorious low-grip, high-tire deg nature of the track began to impact the performance of the No. 1 machine.
Though he fought valiantly, the No. 1 machine would salvage just 10th at the line. Despite the challenging day, the Paul Miller Racing team still leads the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTD points by 62 points over the No. 70 team.
“It was brutal out there. This team worked as hard as we possibly could and to walk away with a tenth place is disappointing,” Paul Miller Racing team owner, Paul Miller, said.
“Our car just wasn’t there in the race. I feel awful for Bryan. He is a great driver and he worked so hard out there to defend against much stronger cars, and we have to do better for him and for Madison.
“As a team, we have to learn from this to improve and to keep fighting throughout the year. But, I have the utmost belief that this crew is going to figure this out.”
The Paul Miller Racing team will be back in action at Watkins Glen International for the next round of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship—Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen at Watkins Glen International June 22-25.
Madison Snow
“Leaving Laguna Seca a little disappointed. It wasn’t as good of a finish as we’ve had the last two races for sure, so it’s just hard to go from winning two in a row to finishing where we did today. There’s still a long season ahead of us and we’ll make improvements before the next races and we’ll be pushing hard to finish on the podium at the next one.”
Bryan Sellers
“Unfortunately just not a good day for us at all. Not a good points day. Not a good results day. We struggled. We struggled on the long run, we struggled in outright speed even to the other BMWs. We have to go back to the drawing board for these types of races—for these low-grip, high-deg tracks—because we still have a couple of them left on the calendar. If we aren’t able to figure something out, it’s going to be difficult for us to be there at the end to fight for a championship. So I’m disappointed with how today went. I thought it was going to end up a little bit better. Hopefully we can go back and find something to help us move forward.”
