Demspey Racing and Silicon Tech Racing Join Forces in 2012

Dempsey Racing and Silicon Tech Racing (STR) have announced a new association that will see Silicon Tech/Dempsey Racing contest the full 2012 American Le Mans Series (ALMS) LMP-C season while setting the foundation for expanded international motorsports programs in the coming years. The announcement was made by Dempsey Racing principals Patrick Dempsey and partner Joe Foster along with STR team principal and driver Henri Richard.

The new collaboration marks Dempsey Racing’s first ALMS prototype effort and continues the momentum of STR’s successful 2011 season that saw the team take part in every major North American sports car endurance race and Richard capture the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series MESCO Building for the Future Rookie of the Year Award.

“Joining with Patrick, Joe and everyone at Dempsey Racing is an amazing opportunity for next year,” Richard said. “They’ve done a very professional job in GRAND-AM, and we all seem to have mutual interest in using this as a forum for our guests and business partners. Dempsey Racing brings a great name to our business-to-business platform, and the value it will bring to each event will be a great boost for our team. According to media value reports, the team created over $10 million in media exposure in 2011, and at the very least I’m sure we’ll have a lot more executives pushed by their wives and daughters to come out to the races! This is also another step forward towards my ultimate objective: competing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in the prototype category.”

Established in 2003 as Hyper Sport, Dempsey Racing has operated from its Atlanta base for the last nine years, primarily focusing on the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series with a fulltime Mazda GT program since 2008. The team fielded a two-car GT effort the last two seasons and posted its first win on the NASCAR short-course race at Watkins Glen in August of 2010. Foster also co-drove with Scott Maxwell to the 2008 GRAND-AM Koni Challenge Series Grand Sport (GS) class championship.

A founding goal of Dempsey Racing was to ultimately expand to a multi-faceted motorsports program with teams competing in several different racing series, and the announcement of the Silicon Tech/Dempsey Racing relationship is a major step in that direction.

“We’ve been seeking to expand our program base for some time and we firmly believe that we’ve arrived at the correct opportunity with Henri and his Silicon Tech Racing partners,” Dempsey said. “Next year will be a big step for Dempsey Racing as we continue to work with our long term manufacturer partner Mazda and expand into the ALMS. We have long term, international aspirations, and long term international partners like Silicon Tech Racing and Mazda will help us achieve those goals.”

Dempsey and Foster, who handles the day-to-day operation of Dempsey Racing along with Team Manager Greg Cates, have also been co-drivers of the team’s No. 40 Mazda RX-8 GT for the last four seasons. The team remains committed to its Mazda GRAND-AM Rolex Series GT program and looks forward to announcing its specifics in the next few weeks.

“Patrick and I both are super excited about having Henri as part of Dempsey Racing and for allowing us this next step as a team,” Foster said. “Patrick has made no secret of his desire to return to Le Mans again and this is the first step in building the team in that direction. We are planning additional announcements both for the Rolex Series and ALMS programs in the coming weeks, so stay tuned.”

Concluding its fourth season of competition in 2011, STR’s results included multiple victories in ALMS and numerous top-10 finishes in the Ferrari Challenge, the Porsche Cup Asia, and the GRAND-AM Rolex Series as well as being awarded the Grand Am MESCO rookie of the Year award.
Richard, who lives in Los Altos Hills, California, is the Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales for Freescale Semiconductor. Producing microprocessors for a number of industries including automotive, consumer electronics, networking and industrial applications, Richard is constantly traveling and engaging in conferences and meetings around the world while leveraging his racing program for corporate and client hospitality and business growth.

Plans for Silicon Tech/Dempsey Racing include taking delivery of a new Oreca FLM-09 and a comprehensive testing plan prior to the season-opening 2012 Mobil 1 12 Hours of Sebring, beginning the venture’s season-long campaign.