- CrowdStrike at forefront of SRO Intercontinental GT Challenge weekend
- Kurtz, Braun, Keating soldier through difficult Indianapolis Eight Hours
- Boehm takes third TC victory of season and second in Drivers Championship
- Top-eight finishes for Moses in GT America finale
- CXO Summit helps cap off 2021 racing season for CrowdStrike/AWS
INDIANAPOLIS (Oct. 17, 2021) – CrowdStrike capped off another successful season in SRO Motorsports America and Fanatec GT World Challenge America Powered by AWS with a strong activation program and solid on-track results at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
A crowded slate of promotions and activations combined with three separate on-track competitions for CrowdStrike Racing made for a full weekend of enjoyment.
RACE RECAPS
The No. 04 CrowdStrike/AWS/DXDT Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 trio of George Kurtz, Colin Braun and Ben Keating arrived at Indianapolis hoping to repeat as Pro-Am winners in the Indianapolis Eight Hours Presented by AWS.
An early-race mechanical issue did away with those hopes with Kurtz losing five laps due to repairs on the No. 04 Mercedes-AMG. That aside and until the final hour, things went relatively smooth for the CrowdStrike Racing entry despite eight full-course caution periods. All three drivers posted consistent lap times in the multi-class endurance race that also featured full, factory entries and a mix of slower GT4 entries.
Unfortunately, hopes for a win sank just outside of one hour to go when the No. 04 entry was retired in sixth place with a mechanical problem. The No. 63 CrowdStrike/AWS Mercedes-AMG GT3 sister car of David Askew, Ryan Dalziel and Scott Smithson was the highest-finishing DXDT entry by finishing fourth in Pro/Am.
“It was a tough day for the CrowdStrike/AWS/DXDT Mercedes,” Braun said. “It’s not the result we were looking for, but I’m proud of our guys. George and Ben did a super job in the car. Luck just wasn’t on our side. You’ll have those days in racing. More than anything, I’m proud of the group and happy for all the CrowdStrike folks that got to come out and see what all this is about. When those folks come out, it’s always a lot of fun and reinvigorates you with what racing it is, how cool it is and how special it is to get a chance to be a part of. I enjoyed our weekend. We have a lot of positives to take away and look forward to what’s next.”
“We had an incredible time together at this race last year. At the podium we decided – right then and there – that we should do this again,” Keating said. “Everything was the same except for the result! What I mean by that is that I really enjoy driving with Colin and George, and working with everyone on the DXDT Racing team. They were all incredible to work with. I do enjoy the Mercedes-AMG. It was difficult to struggle with the performance of our car and not find the smoking gun – we were struggling with our car and couldn’t figure out why. I think we were kind of hopeful that we would start the race and everything would be better. That’s just not the way it worked out. … Regardless, it’s still a lot of fun to run with DXDT and be back in the Mercedes-AMG. I do enjoy the event, the car and the team. It’s one of those experiences that you’re going to have every once in awhile.”
CJ Moses raced a Mercedes-AMG GT3 of his own in a return to the GT America Powered by AWS series. He posted a pair of seventh-place finishes in a deep field with his No. 58 CrowdStrike/AWS/DXDT Mercedes-AMG.
Moses’ run in the first of the two 40-minute races was especially gratifying. He began at the back of the grid but made up eight spots in the first 20 minutes. He picked up another position with 15 minutes to go.
Sunday’s race saw Moses begin ninth and recovered nicely after a chaotic first few laps. He moved back to his original starting position by the 10-minute mark but couldn’t get by a competing car in a faster class over the balance of the race.
“That was a pretty satisfying end to the season,” said Moses, who raced in GT America for the first time since Nashville in early August. “The race weekend went well. It started off not-so great in qualifying and ended up starting from the back. I made my way to mid-pack with a great run. I was able in the second race to go out and race really hard against a car I co-own. It was a fun battle. I was glad to end the season on a high note. Even though it was a shortened for me due to work commitments has been a great one. I look forward to doing it all again next year and making even more races.”
Kevin Boehm ended his TC America season in style with a third TC-class victory Saturday in his No. 9 CrowdStrike/AWS/DXDT Honda Civic Type R TC. Boehm went from third to first at the start of the 40-minute season finale and weathered two full-course caution periods before pulling away for a five-second victory.
That followed a second-place run in a wet-to-drying Friday race that saw Boehm again start third but led for much of the race. The results gave him a second-place finish in the TC Drivers Championship, a year after he won the TCA title.
“Having my wife and my dad working alongside me this whole season is incredible,” Boehm said. “Putting the CrowdStrike Racing and AWS car on the top of the podium for the last race of the season is great. I knew coming into the race that the odds of us winning the championship were pretty low. All I could do was try to win and the rest wasn’t up to me. I’m still happy with the season results. We’ll see what we can learn from this season.”
OPERATION MOTORSPORT
Boehm paid tribute to the crew of Operation Motorsport, members of which assisted him through his 2021 run.
A not-for-profit, OpMo provides a chance for veterans to use their skill sets in a variety of areas including paddock operations, car and tire prep, marketing, social media and other key areas that are part of a racing program.
“It’s really the teamwork we had as a whole group,” Boehm said. “We have Operation Motorsport on board. They’re volunteering their time to come and work on these race cars. We really just try to make it go as fast as we can together. That’s probably the most memorable thing.”
It continues a proud tradition of CrowdStrike supporting veterans and the Operation Motorsport program. Two OpMo beneficiaries were part of Boehm’s TCA championship campaign in 2020. CrowdStrike also is a proud part of American Corporate Partners (ACP), which provides CrowdStrike mentors for service members looking to transition to the private sector.
In addition, CrowdStrike is a partner with HireMilitary to provide meaningful internship experiences to service members exiting the military via the DoD SkillBridge program.
IT’S THE CROWDSTRIKE EXPERIENCE
Throughout the 2021 racing season, CrowdStrike has been at the forefront among activations around SRO Motorsports America weekends. It all centered around CrowdStrike’s role as Official Internet and Cloud Security Partner of SRO Motorsports America.
It provides CrowdStrike – the world’s leading provider of cybersecurity tools and solutions – an opportunity to showcase its methodologies and tools for combating online threats and breaches to a global audience. That’s an aspect that was even more evident this weekend given the international following of the Indianapolis Eight Hours.
CrowdStrike supplies its award-winning Falcon platform to all SRO worldwide entities. It provides an unprecedented level of security by stopping data breaches with a complete set of cloud-delivered technologies that prevent attacks from malware to more critical invasions. The Falcon also is the dominant feature on all CrowdStrike Racing entries in SRO America competition, another point of leverage that racing provides to tell the CrowdStrike story.
The season-ending event also provided CrowdStrike a final opportunity to host its innovative CXO Summit. A program in partnership with AWS, it brings together cybersecurity leaders and CrowdStrike VIPs for discussions on trends, areas of opportunities and improvements that guests can take and implement in their own business.
Shawn Henry, CSO, CrowdStrike and President of CrowdStrike Services, and Angelo Comazzetto, Principal in the Office of the CISO at AWS, led and moderated the summit.
AWS also hosted the Driving Diversity Live Panel at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Pavilion with drivers Robb Holland, Sally McNulty, and Victor Gonzalez, plus Engineer Brian Ma. It also presented a Women in Motorsports Live Panel featuring DXDT Racing’s Erin Vogel as well as Modupe Congleton, AWS’ Head of Inclusion, Diversity and Equity.
TOOLS FOR THE JOB
Henry and everyone associated with CrowdStrike are proud of the influence it has beyond own racing activities. CrowdStrike works with SRO Motorsports America to protect scores of proprietary information such as team and driver medical and financial records, technical data, and video and digital content.
The collaboration between CrowdStrike and Amazon Web Services will play a large front-facing role in SRO America. As Global Official Cloud Provider, Global Official Machine Learning Provider and Global Technology Provider of SRO Motorsports, AWS is in a unique position to help SRO with logistics, data collection and cloud storage – the latter a key team-up area for AWS and CrowdStrike.
Among the benefits to fans is the unique “Race Vision” program, powered by AWS. It allows the series to display performance data from cars on the track in the form of informational graphics to fans on SRO America’s event live streams or television broadcasts on CBS Sports Network.
CrowdStrike’s experiential program in SRO Motorsports America includes multiple virtual elements, as well. CrowdStrike and AWS again presented an exclusive live stream of the two Fanatec GT World Challenge America races with Boehm adding valuable insight from his experience in the cockpit throughout the weekend.
CrowdStrike’s library of video content on CrowdStrikeRacing.com continued to expand, along with the once-a-month sim racing events via the CrowdStrike Cup Virtual Racing League.
CrowdStrike Racing will begin the 2022 SRO Motorsports America season with a home event at Sonoma Raceway on April 15-17.
ABOUT CROWDSTRIKE®
CrowdStrike® Inc. (Nasdaq: CRWD), a global cybersecurity leader, is redefining security for the cloud era with an endpoint protection platform built from the ground up to stop breaches. The CrowdStrike Falcon® platform’s single lightweight-agent architecture leverages cloud-scale artificial intelligence (AI) and offers real-time protection and visibility across the enterprise, preventing attacks on endpoints on or off the network. Powered by the proprietary CrowdStrike Threat Graph®, CrowdStrike Falcon correlates over 2.5 trillion endpoint-related events per week in real time from across the globe, fueling one of the world’s most advanced data platforms for security.
ABOUT DXDT RACING
DXDT Racing is a championship-winning, high-performance sports car racing team founded in 2014 by team principal David Askew and located in Statesville NC. Currently running in three of the four full-time race series under the SRO America umbrella, DXDT Racing is a performance driven team of highly experienced racing professionals, focused on strong execution and success. Providing comprehensive and essential services, DXDT Racing is a top-tier customer racing program, allowing drivers to fully focus on getting the most out of their on-track performance. Follow the team on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook for race season updates.
ABOUT OPERATION MOTORSPORT
Operation Motorsport is a veteran-led and -operated, 501(c)3 Not-for-Profit, based in Brighton, Ontario, Canada; and Raleigh, North Carolina serving Canadian & American service members and veterans. It was founded on the basis of three simple words: Excite, Engage and Empower. The premise is to engage ill and injured Service Members and veterans affected by military service, through Motorsport activities to aid in their recovery and rehabilitation.
Photos: Brian Cleary/BCPix