In pursuit of a Porsche Supercup spot, Part 2 

It’s now April and race season is underway! After anxiously waiting results from the Porsche Supercup Scholarship Shootout, it was announced at the Porsche Night of Champions in Weissach, Germany that France’s Jean-Karl Vernay was awarded the scholarship and will compete in the Supercup for 2013. As for the rest of us seven drivers that were invited to the coveted test in Vallelunga, Italy last fall, we were faced with the challenge of acquiring outside sponsorship to secure a race seat in the prestigious one-make championship.

With the goal of earning a spot on Porsche’s factory team, it was a must that I continue upwards in the Porsche development ladder.  To not win the scholarship was definitely a heartbreaker, but I could not give up. I put the business hat on (even though I have no degree in business or marketing) and began to contact businesses and investors about this European race program and the opportunities it has to offer.

During this time, it was evident I needed to also maintain my race status in North America. The opportunity to join BAR1 Motorsports and lead the driving duties in the No. 8 Le Mans Prototype Challenge (LMPC) car in the American Le Mans Series (ALMS) was offered to me. Having had success with the team in 2011 and 2012, it was a logical decision to continue this program for 2013. I am driving alongside fellow Canadian Chris Cumming for the full ALMS schedule, and will co-drive with Swede Stefan Johansson at Sebring and Road Atlanta. The team has focused a lot on details over the past few months, and I’m confident we are a championship contender.

Day-to-day, I was still working hard to secure a seat in the Porsche Supercup. I spoke with every team in the series about what opportunities they could offer. However, the task appeared to be even more daunting than I had expected. My experience and success in the ALMS and Porsche GT3 Cup Challenge Canada just wasn’t enough. It became obvious that I was a bit of an unknown quantity in the European market, which makes it extremely tough sell myself to any of the teams, even with the endorsement of Porsche on my resume.

With the help and guidance of key North American Porsche representatives, I have worked though every option on the table. As the number of available opportunities began to decrease one-by-one, I really began to stress and become nervous for fear that everything I had been working towards in 2012 with Porsche would go to waste if I could not secure a race seat behind the wheel of a Porsche for 2013.

But after nearly five months of meetings, phone calls and emails, I finally signed a race deal on March 18th with German-based Molitor Racing Systems to compete in the Porsche Carrera Cup Deutschland in 2013.

The Porsche Carrera Cup Deutschland is one of seven national Carrera Cup Series around the world, and is recognized globally as the most competitive. While this is not the top-level Porsche Supercup series, it is definitely the next best solution for me to stay within the Porsche family for 2013. I’m confident this will serve as a good platform to debut in the European motorsport scene and to gain valuable experience in a very competitive championship. My hope is that success here will be realized and serve as a lauchpad for bigger things in the future.

Photography by Molitor Racing Systems