Stuck-Led Porsche Team Wins Sebring : Car Paces Field for More Than Half of 12-Hour Race, Sets Record

A team headed by West German endurance specialist Hans Stuck scorched the 12 Hours of Sebring with a record average speed of 115.852 m.p.h. in a Porsche 962 Saturday to win the the grueling endurance test by eight laps.

Stuck shared the driving chores with car owner Bob Akin, an Ossining, N.Y., businessman, and Austrian Jo Gartner as they led for more than half of the race.

The team took the lead on the 134th lap in the sixth hour and never relinquished it as the record pace was too much for the rest of the field. The old record of 113.787 was set by A.J. Foyt and Bob Wollek in a Porsche 962 last year.

They also set a record with 287 laps and 1,363.25 miles.

Second was a Porsche 962 driven by Jim Busby, Darin Brassfield and John Morton. Another 962 was third despite a 31-minute pit stop in the last two hours. It was driven by Al Holbert, Derek Bell and Al Unser Jr.

Bruce Jenner, the 1976 Olympic decathlon champion, was next with co-driver Scott Pruett, driving their Ford Mustang to a win in the GTO division for less powerful cars than the high-tech prototype Porsches.

NASCAR stock car drivers Bill Elliott and Ricky Rudd were fifth overall and the runner-up to their teammates in GTO.

In the only serious accident, a pit crew member was hit in the head by a flying tire from the winning car and hospitalized with a severe concussion. Jay Jensen, 37, of Atlanta regained consciousness. Doctors said he suffered a tiny hemmorhage of the brain. No surgery was anticipated, and he was expected to be released in three or four days.

Another crew member was hit by a nut from the same tire, but was not seriously injured.

The pace was slowed twice by a caution car. The first time a car had knocked some tires on the track on turn 11. It lasted 13 minutes.

Another caution period after dark was caused by grass fires on the same turn and lasted 15 minutes. Recreational vehicles turned their lights on at the request of officials so the drivers could see better while the fires were extinguished.

It was the 11th straight win for a Porsche at Sebring and the 17th straight in a Camel GT event.

Stuck, 35, was the co-winner with Derek Bell of the World Endurance Championship series last year. The circuit races around the world but not in this country.

It was Stuck’s second win at Sebring. He was a driver of the BMW that won in 1975--the last non-Porsche to win the 12-hour race over the 4.86-mile course built on a World War II Army Air Corps runway.

It was Stuck’s seventh win in 22 starts on the International Motor Sports Assn. Camel GT circuit and his first since the Daytona 24-hour race in 1981.

Akin, 50, has won three divisions at Sebring in 77 starts on the IMSA circuit. For Gartner, at the wheel for the last 2 1/2 hours of the race, it was his first win in three career starts.

Elliott said he was enjoying himself. He said he didn’t have any problems, except “here and there--nothing major. “There’s a couple of holes you can’t see, you just have to keep moving.”

Elliott said although he liked the different kind of racing, he was doing it more for experience than anything else.

“I’m just trying to learn more about road racing,” he said.