The last of four sportscar racing legends to announce their retirement from professional racing in 2021 made his announcement late in the year, bringing the curtain down on a storied career that has spanned two decades with a single marque. The 2022 Rolex 24 Hours will break an 18 year long chain of events in not featuring the red-haired Porsche ace on the entry.
Patrick Long moved rapidly from success in junior single seaters, his professional career starting in the UK in Formula Ford and Formula Renault, via a controversial Red Bull Junior selection at Paul Ricard that saw him score highly against opposition that included A.J. Allmendinger, Paul Edwards, Santa Maria, Joey Hand, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Bryan Sellers and Scott Speed.
He moved not via the Red Bull system but to Porsche, with a Porsche Junior driver role in 2003.
His career thereafter has, with the exception of a single Rolex 24 in a Ford powered DP, irregular, and sometimes successful adventures into the NASCAR package as a road racing specialist and a couple of impressive guest appearances in V8 Supercars at Surfers Paradise (pic below © inetpics.com) has featured one marque throughout.
Whether in one-make racing, GT2, DP, LMP2, Grand Am GT, GT3, GTD, GTE or GTLM, and indeed on a tractor, Pat’s career has been dominated by Porsche.
That has involved one-offs and full seasons with both factory and customer teams with the list of teams that he has raced with a veritable cast list of Porsche success in the 21st century:
Petersen White Lightning, The Racers Group, Flying Lizards, Team Penske, IMSA Matmut, Proton Competition, Falken Motorsport, Effort Racing, Black Swan Racing, Competition Motorsports, Park Place Motorsports and Wright Motorsports just some of them.
Notably, he has scored class wins at all four sportscar “classics” the 24 Hours of Le Mans (2004 (below), 2007);
Rolex 24 At Daytona (2009);
Petit Le Mans (2005, 2006, 2007) and
12 Hours of Sebring (2005).
Patrick is a three-time American Le Mans Series driver’s champion, winning the GT2/GT class in 2005, 2009 and 2010, and won the Pirelli World Challenge Driver’s Championship in 2011 and 2017.
From 2006 to 2008, Patrick drove for the Penske Racing team in a Porsche RS Spyder, culminating in an LMP2 class victory and second place overall at the 2007 Petit Le Mans (top pic Ulli Upietz).
He’s been a trusted lieutenant for Porsche with some of their key programmes and partners, notably the innovative Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid, which took an overall GT win at the 2010 1000 km of Zhuhai in the ILMC.
He was also a key part in taking forward Patrick Dempsey in his driving career, the pair scoring a second place in class at the 2015 Le Mans 24 Hours together with Marco Seefried.
Pat will, very happily, continue to be a very important part, and a familiar face, in Porsche racing circles courtesy of two new roles, a brand Ambassador with Porsche Cars North America and as a Competition Advisor with Porsche Motorsport North America.
