Amesbury, MA. – April 9th, 2013 -- The Turner Motorsport team battled some adversity this past weekend at Barber Motorsports Park emerging with a strong top-five GT finish in Saturday morning’s two-hour long Porsche 250 Rolex Series race.

Although Bill Auberlen and Paul Dalla Lana managed to keep their GT class M3 in the top-five, Michael Marsal and Gunter Schaldach were not so lucky. An early incidental contact by a DP class car forced Michael Marsal off track, preventing the No. 93 GT class M3 from finishing the race after a P9 start. The top-five finish by Auberlen and Dalla Lana allows the No. 94 to remain fourth in team points, only six points from first place going into round four of the Rolex Series competition at Road Atlanta.

Top five finishes seem to be a trend for the driver pairing of Bill Auberlen and Paul Dalla Lana at Barber with a top 5 finish in last year’s Porsche 250 and a win in 2011 for the No. 94 GT class M3.

Bill Auberlen commented, “Barber was a mixed bag of great things. Paul did an amazing job in qualifying, we did a good job in the Rolex race and finished 5th which beat all but one of the people ahead of us in the points. The Turner team did a great job of giving us a very fast and competitive car. We are now only 6 points out of the championship lead which is incredible. That combined with a double victory coming out of Austin, is exactly what we need to do to win the Rolex GT championship.”

Will Turner said, “I am happy leaving Barber with 5th place points for the No. 94. It’s a shame that contact put the 93 car out so early – we were looking forward to seeing what Gunter could do, because he has had great results at Barber in the past.”

The afternoon’s two-and-one-half-hour Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge race did not fare quite as well for the driver duo of Bill Auberlen and Paul Dalla Lana in the No. 96 GS class M3. Dalla Lana started behind the wheel of the No. 96, driving the M3 up to fifth place after qualifying P10. During the first full service pit stop Bill Auberlen jumped behind the wheel of the clicking off his fastest race lap of 1:37.080 on a increasingly greasy track.

The No. 96 GS class M3 completed only 38 laps before making contact with the No. 55 Aston Martin Vantage going into turn five. This caused the No. 96 to briefly go airborne forcing the car into pit lane for suspension damage. The team replaced the front right control arm and tie rod to send it back out on track. Auberlen completed one more lap before serving his stop-and-go plus 60 second penalty before retiring the car back to the paddock with one hour and fifteen minutes remaining in the race.

The Continental Sports Car Challenge race will be televised on SPEED TV on April 13th at 2:00pm ET. The full broadcast of the Rolex series race can be found on Grand-Am.com.

Round 4 of the Rolex Sports Car Series at Road Atlanta will be televised live on SPEED TV on Saturday April 20th at 4:30pm ET. The fourth round of the Continental Sports Car Challenge at Road Atlanta will be tape delayed and televised on April 27th at 2:00pm ET.