Motorsport: Kiwi Hartley revved up for Texas Endurance

The Porsche team of Kiwi Brendon Hartley, Mark Webber and Timo Bernhard have put the Hybrid 919 through three long testing sessions in preparation for this weekend's race.

Porsche driver keen to get going in round four after factory has sorted out the Hybrid 919’s niggles

It's been a long time between gigs for Porsche factory driver Brendon Hartley and the all-new LMP1 Hybrid 919 racecar. However, things are all about to change this weekend in Austin, Texas for round four of the World Endurance Championship.

New Zealander Hartley will get to belt up alongside teammates Australian Mark Webber and German Timo Bernhard for the first time since the Le Mans 24 Hours back in June. The Kiwi acquitted himself well during his night stint at the world's oldest endurance race and at one stage, with two hours to go, Webber was leading the race.

As with all things new, something was bound to happen and the #20 car suffered mechanical trauma and was retired.

Since then the Porsche factory has had three long testing stints and have worked on sorting through the niggling issues and fitting a new aero package in preparation for this weekend's race at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA).

In the most recent test at the former Formula One circuit Magny-Cours in France, Hartley, Marc Lieb and a couple of GT drivers spent two-and-a-half days thundering around the circuit notching up 1903 kilometres in the team's test car.

"Testing has been really, really positive and having three, three-day tests has been great," said Hartley from Texas. "Before Le Mans we had to stop developing the car and concentrate on reliability so all the performance work was put on hold.

"We knew we could improve the car and since Le Mans we've been working on performance and we've seen some really good, positive steps.

"The big question though, is to see how much the other teams have progressed as well - they won't have been sleeping.

"We've made some big gains and everything has been going in the right direction."

This sounds like good news for Hartley, Webber and Bernhard who are very keen to emulate the success they had in their first outing in the 919 at Silverstone in April, where they finished third in the car's first competitive race.

As well as extracting more grunt from the car and the installation of new aero, Porsche have also been evaluating a harder tyre compound from Michelin due to the high temperatures they'll face Texas.

"It's going to be a fine balance in getting the amount of downforce right and how much power we'll need to be fast enough to challenge the others. High drag means using more fuel and as we're limited to the amount of fuel we can use, it's going to be a balancing act.

"Too much drag and we have to start saving fuel by lifting off, which isn't the best thing to do down the straights," said Hartley.

The Kiwi raced at COTA last year in a Daytona Prototype with the Starworks team and came to grips with the track quite quickly. In fact he was leading the race with 15 minutes to go when he came across a lapped GT car and an altercation occurred that put both cars out.

While not happy about what happened, Hartley has put his hand up and accepted it was his fault. Being the consummate professional he is, he said he learnt a lot from that incident and it helped him deal better with similar situations in the future.

"Okay it wasn't the best of weekends but I was quick here last year and I love the place. It throws up a lot of challenges - quick flowing corners, very technical tight and twisty corners and long straights for passing. It is a good layout.

"I'm very optimistic and we are heading in the right direction with the car, but I'm also very aware it's going to be tough fight," said Hartley.