ATLANTA - Tafel Racing will leave nothing on the table as it makes its Ferrari debut at the 56th Annual Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring. The Jim Tafel (Alpharetta, Ga.) owned team will enter two Ferrari F430 GTC, the Nos. 71 and 73, in the March 15th American Le Mans Series season-opener. The Tony Dowe (Cumming, Ga.) managed operation has assembled one of the strongest GT2 class driver lineups in recent memory to go after not only the classic American endurance event at Sebring (Fla.) International Raceway but the American Le Mans Series GT2 championship as well.

The full-season driver lineup in the No. 71 Tafel Racing Ferrari F430 GTC was announced previously with 2007 FIA GT Series GT2 class Champion Dirk Müller (a native of Germany now living in Monaco) being paired with Dominik Farnbacher (Ansbach, Germany). Müller, the 2000 American Le Mans Series GT2 (then known as GT) Champion, has three Sebring starts including the GT2 class victory in 2000. He has eight American Le Mans Series victories in 37 starts. Farnbacher has 14 Series GT2 starts with two podiums, both career-high second-place finishes driving for Tafel in the last two races of '07. The duo will share the No. 71 at Sebring with 2007 Le Mans Series GT2 class Champion Rob Bell (Northants, England). Bell is making his American Le Mans Series debut but drove the Ferrari F430 GT to two wins and four additional podiums in the highly competitive European variant of the Series on his way to the '07 title. He finished fifth at the 24 Hours of Le Mans last season driving a Panoz Esperante.The lineup in the second Tafel Racing Ferrari is also impressive. Tafel himself will be joined in the No. 73 machine by Danish-born Allan Simonsen. Simonsen, who now calls Melbourne, Australia home, is one of the most diverse and accomplished drivers in motorsports today. He won the 2007 Australian GT Championship behind the wheel of an F430 and took four podium finishes (one win) in the first four races of the 2007 Le Mans Series GT2 class driving a Ferrari F430 GT with Tafel teammate Rob Bell. Simonsen also enjoyed success at Le Mans finishing third driving a Porsche. He finished third behind Bell in the season-long Le Mans Series GT2 drivers championship after missing the penultimate round at Silverstone, due to V8 Supercar commitments at Bathurst, where he scored a 5th place with Team Vodafone. Rounding-out the driving squad for the No. 73 will be multi-time endurance race starter Pierre Ehret (who lives in Santa Rosa, Calif but was born in Germany). Ehret has two starts in the 12 Hour and has run six 24 hour races; three each at Le Mans and Daytona.
Jim Tafel will be making his 12th Series start at Sebring, his second 12 Hour. He has two top-five finishes including a fifth at Sebring last March. Bringing the cooperative effort of the team full circle, Bell, Ehret and Simonsen have all teamed together at various times in recent years.

Tafel, Ehret, Farnbacher and Müller will test the No. 71 Tafel Racing Ferrari F430 GTC at next week's "Wheels Down" American Le Mans Series Winter Test at Sebring. The four drivers will rotate behind the wheel of the recently delivered mid-engine, Italian race car from January 28-30. It marks the second time the car has run, the first being a highly successful shakedown run at Ferrari's legendary test track, Fiorano, on January 11 where Müller and Farnbacher put the car through its paces. The visit to Sebring's 3.7- mile, 17-turn circuit will be the team's first opportunity to begin fine-tuning the car to team and driver preferences. Several other GT2 teams and manufacturers will be onsite during the test as well giving the Cumming Ga.-based effort a sense of where the new Ferrari F430 GTC stacks up against the competition.