Tincknell Looking to Build On Proton’s Porsche 963 Debut

Photo: Porsche

Harry Tincknell said Proton Competition is looking to build on from last month’s 6 Hours of Monza debut with its customer Porsche 963 and continue to “keep working hard” as the German squad comes to grips with top-class prototype racing.

Tincknell and co-driver Gianmaria Bruni are set to give the car its first outing in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship this weekend at Road America, as part of an increased ten-car GTP class entry.

It comes on the heels of Tincknell, Bruni and Neel Jani taking part in last month’s FIA World Endurance Championship round in Italy with the same chassis, which saw a promising run end early due to a non-mechanical related issue.

“Monza was very much a case of… We got the car the Friday before,” Tincknell explained. “I sat in it for the first time on Thursday and the first time we drove it was FP1 on Friday.

“By Sunday, which we actually led the race for a few laps, not really in the real world, but we were still in the top-four or five throughout.

“That was definitely beyond our expectations. But clearly coming from zero miles, our learning curve was a pretty vertical line.

“We took a lot away from that race. It was unfortunate that we had to stop. It was not a mechanical failure at all; it was just one of those things where a cable came loose and we couldn’t get the car back to the pits.

“Ultimately it was big learning [curve]. I think we were just happy to get the car on track that weekend.”

Tincknell revealed that the team was limited in various areas of setup at Monza, which has since been resolved.

“We weren’t efficient with the optimum setup or anything like that and we actually didn’t even have a lot of the setup options available, like we physically didn’t have the parts,” he said.

“We were limited in what we could do, so therefore we were very happy with the result.

“Hopefully for this weekend we’re going to be a lot better organized. We’re on the sim and have been doing a lot in the sim world.

“We’d love be doing more in the real world but right now it’s race to race for us and a lot of the competition has been testing at Road America. There was also the test at Indy last weekend.

“For sure we’re still in that data gathering. Every lap we do is an important lap right now.

“As we showed in Monza, we’re going to keep our heads down and keep working. If we do that, it’s amazing what you can achieve.”

The former Mazda DPi driver said there will be plenty of new experiences this weekend at Road America as well.

“For sure there’s a lot we can build on but there’s a lot of new stuff,” Tincknell said. “In IMSA, the aero package is slightly different with the Porsche vs. WEC.

“We’ve got a few new personnel on board as well. We’re excited that we’ve got Jeromy Moore, who is an ex-Porsche LMP1 engineer. I think a lot of people wanted him and we’ve got him, which is great.

“We’re looking forward to building these relationships and keep improving.

“It’s another weekend where every single lap is vital to us.”

Road America will mark the first of a three-race WeatherTech Championship program to close out the GTP season, alongside completing the remainder of the WEC campaign with a separate chassis.

Proton has plans to enter both championships full-time next year, potentially with two cars apiece.

“For us in IMSA, we have three individual races; we’re not going for any championships,” Tincknell said.

“If we’re in a position to be aggressive on strategy and not having to hold back thinking about championship points or anything like that, it’s a nice position to be in.

“At the same time we don’t want to come in and create the wrong headlines either.

“We’ve got a very good perspective going into the weekend. It’s kind of Monza 2.0 in terms of just keeping our heads down, getting the laps, integrate the new personnel on the team who I think will be a big help to us and just keep learning and hopefully by the race we’re in a position where we can mix it.

“If it’s not this weekend, then it’s building towards Indy and obviously Petit, where I’m certain by then we’ll be in the fight.

“You see what the JDC car is doing compared to the factory cars. It shows it’s possible. We’re looking forward to 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