Tatiana Calderón’s IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup season came to an end with yet more bad luck hitting her Gradient Racing team in the Petit Le Mans finale.
On her first appearance in the famous 10-hour endurance race at the fast, flowing Road Atlanta circuit, Tatiana and her teammates aboard the #66 Gradient Acura NSX GT3 Evo22, Stevan McAleer and Sheena Monk finished 13th in the GT Daytona (GTD) class after a gruelling race.
Any chance of fighting for a top result was taken away during the second hour of the race, following a right-rear puncture due to contact with the #24 BMW GTP prototype. Further contact with the #9 McLaren GTD Pro car, which sent Monk into a spin and into the gravel trap, left the team nearly four laps down, mostly due to the recovery process.
It was against this backdrop that Tatiana first took over the car midway through the fourth hour, staying on board for a full double stint lasting nearly two hours before handing over to McAleer. She later returned to the car for a single stint at around the six-hour mark, during which she set the car’s fastest lap of the race, a 1’20.692.
While IMSA rules allow lapped cars to gain a lap back whenever the safety car appears, there were simply not enough such interventions over the remainder of the race to make up for the ground lost during the Gradient team’s early setbacks.
The race, which also marked the last-ever IMSA appearance for the Acura NSX GT3, brings down the curtain on a character-building season for Tatiana, who has gained more important experience in North American sports car racing despite a lack of headline results.
Tatiana Calderón: “Definitely not the way we wanted to finish our IMSA season. We lost a couple of laps early on with a puncture and the timing of that and what unfolded right after Sheena rejoined from the pits was quite unlucky and then we didn’t have that many caution periods after that, so it was impossible to recover from that early deficit. It was just one minute of bad luck which really took away any chance of a good result. During my stints the car felt Ok but compared to previous weekends I think we were missing some pace in the car. Without the early problems I think we were competitive enough to fight in the top 10. As it was my first time at Petit Le Mans, I think it was important for me to get into a rhythm with the traffic and driving at night because it’s not an easy track to feel confident at. I’m happy with my performance.
“I want to thank everyone that has supported me this year, including my sponsors, Karol G’s Con Cora Foundation, Wandr Studio, AVL RaceTech, Escudería Telmex, the Colombian Ministry of Sport and Rimas Sports. Hopefully we can build better things for the future. I also want to thank the whole Gradient team and my teammates Stevan and Sheena, who it has been a pleasure to work with. Now I am looking forward to seeing what the future holds.”
With the five-round IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup season now concluded, Tatiana will turn her attention towards finalising her 2025 plans in the coming months.
Comments