Coleman “As Shocked As Anyone” By Abu Dhabi Win

Todd Coleman said he will “need a few day to think about this” after he won the Lenovo Gulf 12 Hours, adding he was “as shocked as anyone” to take victory in only his second start in GT3 machinery.

Coleman, sharing the No. 69 Optimum Motorsport McLaren 720S GT3 Evo with Aaron Telitz and Frederik Schandorff, came out on top in Sunday’s 14th running of the Abu Dhabi enduro after defeating Sainteloc Racing.

The win came at the end of the American Bronze-rated driver’s second-ever appearance at the wheel of a GT3 car, having debuted in September’s 24h Barcelona, also alongside Telitz and Schandorff.

“I probably need a few days to think about this,” Coleman told Sportscar365.

“We walked into this thinking we were going to get experience and kick off the 2025 season, but to come out with a win, like, I’m as shocked as anyone, but hell of a team effort.

“We started believing as these two got in the car with four hours to go and then all of a sudden you start to kind of not want to believe for a while just to make sure it comes true. Huge effort.”

Coleman got his drive time completed during the first, eight-hour segment, meaning Telitz and Schandorff did two stints each to finish off the race for the second part after the intervention.

After starting second, Telitz quickly passed Marschall and opened up a gap, only to lose the lead again after a safety car restart.

“I had some fun racing at the start there, and then on the restart, just couldn’t get the tires fired off for whatever reason,” said Telitz.

“Not sure, maybe I didn’t keep them warm enough behind the safety car. It’s the only thing I can think of.

“Then yeah, the car was still super fast and we knew we had some good strategy to get back to the front.

“We had Fred in our pocket so tossed him in for the last two hours and he made the magic happen.”

Schandorff drove the No. 69 McLaren in the closing two stints, during which he gradually closed in on the No. 25 Audi to the point he was just over a second behind when the final round of stops commenced.

When asked if he believed he would still be able to catch the Sainteloc car when he started his final double stint, Schandorff replied:

“Not at all. The first stint I was just pushing like mad so it was probably one of my most fun stints.

“Also because you need to be so precise. You want to extract everything but you cannot do mistakes and it was really, really good fun.

“I just managed to get in there just behind [the Audi] before we boxed and we just did a really good undercut in there.

“I think they boxed two laps later than us and then for the new tires we just made a good gap for them.

“The first few laps in the second stint versus the drivers coming from the pit you always gain a little bit of lap time. I think that’s what made us the difference today as well.”

Schandorff encountered an issue with the car’s diffuser en route to victory, which was visibly vibrating during the closing hour of the race.

“It was bouncing a little bit,” Schandorff said.

“You could hear it in the car, so I actually thought, ‘Okay it’s not gonna last.’ But it did and it was fine, so…”