Photo: Fred Hardy/SRO
Parker Thompson says he has “high hopes” to mount a title run for the Silver class in Pirelli GT4 America, in the second season of Hanley Motorsports.
The Toyota-contracted driver has momentum on his side, coming off his second career IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship victory in last month’s Grand Prix of Long Beach and heads into this weekend’s GT4 America double-header at Sebring International Raceway fifth in the standings alongside co-driver Daniel Hanley in their No. 999 Toyota GR Supra GT4 EVO.
For Thompson, who is juggling multiple full-season sports car racing programs this year, his target is to continue riding the wave of success.
“When you talk about momentum of my career, it’s momentum with Toyota across the board,” he told Sportscar365.
“Obviously TRD has brought me in here and we’re having a lot of success with our Lexus Racing program and then we’re also winning a lot of races in a Toyota Supra GT4.
“Last year we won Michelin Pilot [Challenge] for the first-ever time with Hattori Motorsports in a one-off and then we won a couple races in GT4 America.”
Thompson and Hanley scored Silver class honors in races at Circuit of The Americas and Sebring in the 2023 season, in what was considered a building year for the upstart Hanley Motorsports organization.
“Rob Hanley was once a teammate of mine — the owner of Hanley Motorsports — and now I’m racing with his son,” Thompson said.
“It goes really deep with how I am within this organization.
“I started out as basically… you could probably have called me the defacto team manager. Now I’ve moved to more of just a driver role.
“It’s pretty cool to see where the program has come. We started with ez-ups out of basically the back of a pickup truck and now we have a rig, a tent and a great group of people that are top-notch.
“You saw it at Sonoma. We qualified very well. Unfortunately there were a few mistakes across the board, even on my side, led to a performance that we want more of.
“That’s what I love about these championships is that you don’t win them until about halfway to three-quarters [of the season] and we’ve got a lot of momentum heading into Sebring.”
Despite facing increased competition in the Silver category this year, Thompson has remained bullish on their title prospects.
“It is a lot stronger compared to the previous years but that just shows you the work we’re putting in,” he said.
“Daniel qualified fourth overall at Sonoma, which was unreal. And at our Sebring test, he was even faster.
“I wouldn’t be surprised to see Daniel Hanley be hot on my heels.
“I think Hanley Motorsports is in for a lot of wins for Toyota. I have really high hopes that we’re going to go claim that championship.”
Read More: Thompson With “High Hopes” for Silver Class Title Run – Sportscar365