DEMPSEY LIVES THE McDREAMY DREAM
Television and movie star Patrick Dempsey has landed a new leading role, and it's one that sees the greying 58-year-old re-kindle the great love of his life.
In a rom-com with a difference he has returned to racing.
This time around, People magazine’s 2023 Sexiest Man Alive (at 57!) contested the brutally cut-throat Porsche Endurance Challenge North America behind the wheel of a 718 Cayman GT4 Clubsport with the highly-rated Wright Motorsports team backed by Mobil 1 oil.
Reckon it was hard for Dempsey to pick up a blue-riband sponsor? Nah, me neither.
Dempsey is, of course, best known for playing Dr Derek Shepperd (AKA Dr McDreamy) on the long running hit TV series Grey’s Anatomy and he also has a long list of movie credits.
But it’s his new role that allowed him to indulge his real passion - motor racing.
Not surprisingly, his racing return also sees him headlining a docuseries called Back on Track, which is now showing on a YouTube screen near you. For free.
Produced by Hagerty Media, the four episodes show Dempsey making a circuit comeback for the first time since 2015 and gives a behind-the-scenes look at whether the silver-haired superstar can recapture his old racing mojo.
“This has been a really exciting project to work on,” enthused Dempsey when announcing the series.
He does, of course, hope that many people will hit YouTube to see if the Hollywood heart-throb will cash-in on his comeback or just crash out.
“All eyes are on you. If you make a mistake you’re the first one they talk about," he admits.
The Porsche Endurance series ran over four rounds, starting at the Circuit of the Americas (COTA) in May before heading to Road America, Sonoma and ending with a six-hour epic back at COTA in Texas last weekend.
The first two episodes have already dropped on YouTube with the remaining two coming up soon.
Having watched the first two, I’ll say that they are really worth viewing.
At roughly 15 minutes each, they give a great overall picture of the racing itself plus all the behind-the-scenes stuff, especially Dempsey’s hard slog to get his mind back into the right place to race at the top level again.
Of course it doesn’t always go to plan, but Dempsey comes across as the kind of guy you’d love to share a beer and a laugh with.
Between 2007 and 2015 Dempsey took his racing very, very seriously. Acting was his job, motorsport was his passion.
After contesting his first Le Mans 24-Hour race in 2009, driving a Ferrari F430 GT2, Dempsey even contemplated giving up acting to pursue a full-time career in motorsport.
“I think I could do that (quit acting) quite easily,” he said at the time.
“I would like to make it (racing) a complete priority and just focus on this full-time.”
That dream never became a reality, as Dempsey continuing to grace the silver screen to bring in the bucks needed to fuel his passion project - owning his own Porsche team - Dempsey Racing - to contest races around the world.
Not only was he ridiculously good looking, friendly and down to earth, but he could drive and on his day go wheel-to-wheel with the best in the business.
On his reasonably impressive racing CV you’ll find a second in the GTE class at Le Mans in 2015 and a third in GT at the Daytona 24 Hour in 2011.
Dempsey’s endurance partner for 2024 was Patrick Long, who never had a role in Grey’s Anatomy but who has been a huge motorsport star for many years.
A longtime Porsche factory driver, Long has a couple of GT victories at both the Le Mans and Daytona 24 races on his impressive resume.
Australian motor racing enthusiasts will probably best remember him for sharing the winning Porsche GT3-R with Aussie Matt Campbell in the 2017 Bathurst 12-Hour.
He even made a couple of V8 Supercar starts, contesting the Gold Coast race in 2010 with Garry Rogers Motorsport (4th/11th) and with Walkinshaw Bundaberg Racing a year later (5th/17th).
He’s very much the seasoned pro and voice of experience in Dempsey’s racing comeback, but the pair are also close friends and shared a car back in the days when the actor was on the WEC trail.
As music maestro and Countdown host on the ABC, Molly Meldrum, used to say “do yourself a favour” and look for Back On Track on YouTube.