Emanuele Pirro and Jonny Cocker will team up for Drayson Racing this weekend at Miller Motorsports Park after Paul Drayson was ruled out with a “non-motorsport” injury.
“I am very disappointed to be sitting this one out,” says Drayson. “I know that Emanuele and the team will do an outstanding job and I’m looking forward to cheering them on from the pit lane.”
The last minute move sees Pirro drafted into for the Larry H. Miller Dealerships Gran Prix having already been signed with the team as their third driver for endurance races – already having raced at Sebring, Laguna Seca and Le Mans with the Anglo-American squad.
The emergency duo will prepare for the race with a test session on the Utah venue's “outer loop” layout. The team currently lie fourth in the ALMS prototype standings. Cocker lies seventh in te drivers' standings, Pirro a place further back.
“We will certainly have a new set of challenges without Paul in the car this weekend at Miller Motorsports Park. It will force us to adapt quickly but we have assembled a group here that can react to just this sort of thing in an instant; I think we proved that at Le Mans,” said team manager Dale White.
“We’re all incredibly disappointed that Paul won’t be able to race with Jonny this weekend but, fortunately, we were able to get Emanuele on very short notice. He has had to step out of a ride at the Le Mans Classic to do this but we can go into this race with the smallest amount of unknown variables and that is a huge advantage in a very disappointing scenario.”
The unfortunate events come at potentially exactly the wrong time for the Lola-Judd running team with the ALMS about embark on a gruelling schedule of five events in the next eight weeks. However, the team suggest there is “every indication” Drayson will return to the cockpit for the July 21 event at Lime Rock Park.
