1st victory for car #41 @ Watkins Glen

James Gue and Leh Keen celebrate Team Seattle's first win in car #41.

WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. (August 7, 2010) – James Gué and Leh Keen co-drove to victory in Saturday’s Crown Royal 200 at The Glen to score the first career GRAND-AM Rolex Series GT wins for Gué, Dempsey Racing and the first-year No. 41 Team Seattle/Global Diving/Dempsey Racing Mazda RX-8 GT team.

“It’s coming near to the end of the season, so we were running out of time to do it, but I just always knew we were going to get a win this season,” said Keen, who passed the No. 70 Castrol Syntec Mazda RX-8 GT of Jonathan Bomarito with just four laps remaining.  “It just feels so great, and almost like we finally got the monkey off our backs, because we could have got a win before now.  It just goes to show how good of a team this is. This was a tough race and we got the job done today and had a great car.”

Gué started the race from fourth place on the starting grid and battled and stayed in the top five throughout his opening stint.  He pitted just before the mandatory 45-minute rule to hand the Mazda over to Keen, and the No. 41 crew performed another top pit stop.

“The team has been improving, and every race we get better and better, especially these last couple of races,” Gué said.  “The guys in the pits did just a phenomenal job and we had great pit work all day.  We had no problems at all and that was certainly a huge factor in getting us on the top step of the podium today.”

The crew got Keen out of the pits in third and he moved past the No. 57 Stevenson Motorsports Camaro of Robin Liddell for second with just under 45 minutes to go.

“We came into this race battling the No. 57 for third in the championship and we knew we had to finish in front of them,” Keen said.  “It couldn’t have been a better weekend for us because we got our win that we wanted and that the team really deserves.  We also put a gap on the No. 57 in points.”

While reigning Rolex Series GT Champion Keen took his seventh career GRAND-AM victory, Gué scored his first Rolex Series GT win to go along with victories in ALMS and the GRAND-AM Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge.  “It’s awesome to finally get a win in the Rolex Series, it is pretty cool,” Gué said.  “It is also great to have John and Jeri Graham here from Global Diving and have to them share in the victory because they are reason all of this is happening. And it feels even better to know that we are doing this to support Seattle Children’s Hospital as well. When we win they win.”

The No. 41 Team Seattle/Global Diving Mazda RX-8 GT is third in the GRAND-AM Rolex Series GT Team Championship standings with 264 points.  The No. 70 Mazda is second with 286 points, just four behind their championship leading No. 69 FXDD/SpeedSource Mazda RX-8 GT teammates, who are on top with 290 points.  Keen and Gué also have 264 points in the GRAND-AM Rolex Series GT Driver Championship standings, which ranks them sixth overall.

Next up for Dempsey Racing and the GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series is the Montreal 200 at Circuit Gilles Villeneuve in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, August 27 – 28.  The two-hour race can be seen live on SPEED, Saturday, August 28, at 2 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT.

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