Hawksworth: Consistency Key to “Perfect Start” to Season

Photo: Jake Galstad/IMSA

Jack Hawksworth said Vasser Sullivan’s rate of consistency has been something the team and Lexus have “worked hard at” over the last two seasons in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship.

The No. 14 Lexus RC F GT3 of Hawkworth and co-driver Ben Barnicoat lead the GTD Pro class championship entering this weekend’s Sahlen’s Six Hours of The Glen on a streak of eight consecutive podium finishes, which dates back to last year’s Northeast Grand Prix at Lime Rock Park.

Its included three class wins, the most recent coming at Long Beach in April.

“It’s been a perfect start to the season for us, really,” Hawksworth said. “We’ve been consistently up there every weekend, whether we’ve been on the pace or we’ve been off the pace, we’ve made it happen and been able to get results.

“Watkins is a track where we have won out there in the past in the sprint race but we’ve never won the six-hour before. But it’s a track that I love.

“It’s a track which the Lexus has always gone well at. I’m certainly looking forward to this one and if we could be on the top step, that’d be even sweeter.

“But nothing changes for us, really, we’re just focused on doing what we’ve been doing all year, which is running a clean race, trying to be strategically smart, be aggressive and go for it.”

When asked by Sportscar365 on what he believes have been some of the factors that have gone into the team’s ultra-consistent form, Hawksworth attributed it to a number of elements.

“It’s something we’ve really worked hard at,” he said. “There isn’t really one thing, to be honest, it’s a combination of many, many things all coming together.

“We’ve had good consistency with the crew, especially on the 14 side of the garage. We’ve had the same mechanics, the same engineer, the same with me and Ben, we’re obviously in our second year together.

“We’ve got a lot of consistency there in terms of people and the group we have together, we get on well together, we gel really well. Everybody knows the job and everybody is aware of what’s required for every session at every weekend.

“I think it’s a lot of hard work from everybody involved in the team, everybody involved with this program to get it to the point now where we’re able to go out there every weekend and do the best we can and get the most out of our package and perform at the highest level and continue to try and get better.

“That’s how you can be consistent in this championship. The ebbs and flows of the pace between the different cars, it’s not possible to have the quickest car every weekend. On those weekends where it’s not the quickest, you’ve got to find a way to be there somehow.

“Whether that’s good pit work, good strategy, good driving. Then on the weekends when you have a car to win, you’ve got to win. It’s been a well-oiled machine that we’re continually trying to work on to get better and better and better.”

Watkins Glen to Offer “Big Opportunity” for Potential Points Haul

With four additional cars entered in GTD Pro this weekend that are not running for the season-long championship, in a class that features five full-time entries, Hawksworth said the third leg of the Michelin Endurance Cup could help their championship chances.

Hawksworth and Barnicoat currently hold a 41-point lead over WeatherTech Racing’s Jules Gounon and Dani Juncadella, with the Pfaff Motorsports pairing of Klaus Bachler and Patrick Pilet only 50 points further behind.

“Maybe there’s two different mindsets,” Hawksworth explained. “But for us we see this as a big opportunity this weekend. There’s more cars in the class. That means there’s more opportunity to put points on our rivals.

“We know we’re going to a track which we should be strong at. If anything, it gives us motivation to go out there, win this race.

“If we can get some cars that are not full season in between us and our main competitors, all the better for it.”

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John