Through the middle of the night it looked like the Porsche juggernaut was going to charge away with the GTLM class with a 1-2 finish on debut for the new CORE autosport-run Porsche North America squad.

But as if often the case in endurance racing, just when you think you have things covered, gremlins start to arrive. Sadly for Pat Long, Michael Christensen and Joerg Bergmeister those gremlins sent the No.912 Porsche back to the garage with what turned out to be a terminal engine problem.

The sister car of Richard Lietz, Patrick Pilet and Nick Tandy continues to lead but despite the set-back, Long remains proud of what the team has achieved in a short amount of time.

“It really wasn’t a short race for us. The goal was to stay clean with both cars, run as a team and be there when the sun came up and we achieved that,” Long said.