Cameron: Porsche Penske “Trending in the Right Direction”

Photo: Porsche

Dane Cameron believes that Porsche Penske Motorsport’s FIA World Endurance Championship program is “trending in the right direction” following recent strong showings by the factory Porsche 963 squad.

While Cameron and co-drivers Michael Christensen and Fred Makowiecki have yet to reach the podium this season, the sister No. 6 Porsche has earned a pair of third-place finishes, including arguably Porsche Penske’s strongest performance of the season last time out at Fuji Speedway.

Speaking with Sportscar365 in Japan prior to the breakout performance, Cameron highlighted key focal points the program has been narrowing in on.

“Certainly, there was a lot of expectation on the whole program when you take the partners that we have with Team Penske, Porsche and everybody,” he said. “A lot of really good guys in the car and outside the car.

“There was certainly a lot of expectation on the program. Can we be satisfied? Of course not with what we’ve achieved. It’s also very difficult to begin as an entirely new team and the blending of the two halves of the operations. There are a lot of things to do and progress.

“I’m happy with the last few races. I think we’ve been better at executing fairly well. Getting to the end of these races and saying, I think we made the right choices and the car was pretty good. We were better than last time. We were better than we tested.

“It’s all trending in the right direction. It just hasn’t really yielded the results that I think are desired by everybody internally and expected externally. I think it’s trending in the right direction.

“We’re just trying to focus as much as we can within and making sure we’re as reliable as we can be.”

Cameron and his co-drivers currently sit seventh in the drivers’ world championship, one position behind teammates Laurens Vanthoor, Kevin Estre and Andre Lotterer, who have flown the flag for the program in WEC competition this year.

“We’re executing as well as we can be,” Cameron said. “The cars are improving. We keep trying to carry on that path. As long as we’re not at the point where we’re screwing it up for ourselves or not executing 100 percent, then I know what you can do at this point.

“We’ll see what the future looks like and more new cars that are coming. Let’s see what happens. I think everyone’s still trying to take the long-term vision. The cars were pretty good at Le Mans, which is obviously important.

“We still feel like every day we’re getting better and better.

“To be a team that’s only eight months old or nine months old versus a team like Toyota that’s established for more than ten years, it takes some time for us. I think we’re getting there and everything’s headed in the right direction. We’re just trying to carry on in this way as much as we can.”

When asked if they feel like this season could be used as a learning year to get a so-called jump start on newcomers to the Hypercar class next year, such as Alpine, BMW and Lamborghini, Cameron indicated the points that could be used moving forward.

“I think for us, it’s really valuable just to have that and just try to continue to evolve,” he said.

“The race weekends are difficult, I would say. It’s slightly different from IMSA. That’s my experience where you have probably a little more track time, you have more tires, and you have less drivers. You kind of crank through a little bit more on the car side.

“Here, it seems a little more difficult because you have the two tires to choose from, the weather’s a little more predictable at some of these places, you’ve got an extra guy to get through. That kind of cuts into your, let’s say, at the racetrack development time.

“If you show up on the wrong foot, it’s maybe a little more difficult than IMSA to right the ship, let’s say.

“To be able to leave these places and say, this is the direction of our car, these places were good, these were bad, and then really fine-tune and streamline that for the future, hopefully can help us.

“We’re certainly not satisfied as we’re at and trying to push everything to where we desire to be.”

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