Shift Up Now Athletes Hannah Greenemeier and Hannah Grisham earned a top-five finish on Saturday and followed it up with a podium on Sunday during the Pirelli GT4 America Series at Sebring International Raceway on May 3-5, 2024.
Driving the No. 26 Heart of Racing Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT4 car, Greenemeier and Grisham took to the 3.74-mile, 17-turn track for practice on Thursday. As a former airport, Sebring is notorious for its bumpy racing surface, particularly in the concrete sections of pavement through turn one and the final corner.
On Friday, the female duo - now nicknamed “The Grish” and “The Green” by their team - ran P5 in their class in the first practice session and P6 in the second, among the 29-car GT4 field.
Qualifying took place on Saturday morning under warm and sunny skies. Greenemeier was the first of the two Heart of Racing drivers to head out for the first half of the qualifying session. She would set the team’s starting position for race one, and be the starting driver. She set her personal-best times of the weekend, putting the car P4 in class for the first race.
Grisham then took the wheel for the second half of qualifying to set the team’s starting position for race two. Despite encountering heavy traffic, she also achieved personal-best times for the weekend and put the car in P9 for the second race.
Race one took place on Saturday at 5:00 p.m. ET. Greenemeier had a great start to the 60- minute competition, making passes on the first lap into turn one, then turn three, and through turn five. She had advanced to P2 in class (top 15 overall) and had set up a great buffer for Grisham at the driver change. However, an incident between several other drivers caused a full- course caution, bunching the field up and negating the advantage.
The race went green again just briefly before it was time for the mandatory pit stops. Afterward, Grisham fought hard for the remainder of the race to bring home a P5 finish.
Sunday’s 60-minute sprint race began at 3:00 p.m. ET and Grisham was behind the wheel, starting P9 for the Heart of Racing duo. During her 25-minute stint, she passed more than ten cars. She was chasing down P4 when the team elected to bring her in at the start of the pit window due to a stopped car on the back straight, and the risk of a caution flag.
The Heart of Racing team had a smooth pit stop, then Greenemeier took the wheel. She was able to get almost two laps at full speed before a full-course caution flew. Those flying laps would prove to be pivotal, as “the Hannahs” would cycle to P3 in class (inside the top 15 overall) once the remainder of the field completed their mandatory stops.
On the restart, Greenemeier got back up to pace, putting Pro-Am and Silver cars between herself and the P4 car, and building a buffer. When the checkered flag flew, the team was on the podium, finishing P11 overall and earning the Super Fuel Hard Charger award for gaining 13 positions.
This marked the third podium in four starts this season for “The Grish” and “The Green” as teammates.
“Today was really strong,” said Grisham. “We started pretty far back but were able to make our way towards the front of the pack. We ended up with the Hard Charger Award and made it up to P3. So we’re really happy about that. A huge thank you to The Heart of Racing team and Hannah (Greenemeier). Next is to continue the momentum at COTA and hopefully to the championship.”
Greenemeier echoed Grisham’s sentiments, saying, “Overall, it was a good weekend. We definitely did not have as much pace as we would have liked, but in the end it was a good points weekend. So now we’ll just move on to COTA in a couple of weeks and just try and keep up the good point races each weekend, and see where we end up in the championship.”
The next race for Greenemeier and Grisham on the Pirelli GT4 America schedule is Round 5 at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas on May 17-19, 2024.
