World Challenge Race - Rounds 3 & 4
Lime Rock Park, CT
23-26 May, 2003

It's All Downhill...

This weekend was a double-header for GT and I was really excited about it. I hadn't been to Lime Rock in a couple of years, but it's a fun, sprinty track and I looked forward to racing somewhere that I was familiar with. Too bad the fun was so short-lived.

It was raining off and on all weekend and as I've said before, I don't like driving in the wet. But, ya gotta do what ya gotta do, so I put my head down and just drove. I did manage to qualify ahead of a number of cars including Bill Auberlen which felt good. I assumed that there was something wrong with Auberlen's car, but it was still nice to pass one of the leaders. I also got by Boris Said at one point. He passed me going thru Turn 3, but got loose in the wet and did a lazy 360 in front of me in Turn 4. Just goes to show, even the pros make mistakes.

Raceday looked more promising and I was hopeful that if the weather held, I could shave a few seconds off my time during the race. I had a good start and got past a few cars in the opening laps. I was most pleased that I managed to pass and stay ahead of my dad who was there racing his Morgan Aero 8 GT(R). Unfortunately, my enjoyment was short lived as things went all wrong on about the fourth lap.

Lime Rock is only a 1.5 mile circuit and the race leaders were turning 55 second laps. Since I was a good (OK, not so good) 5-10 seconds slower than them, I prepared to be lapped early on. The BMWs and Audis were in the lead along with John Young in his Saleen SR and Fitzgerald and Culver in their Porsches. My crew chief, Paul, radioed to tell me that they would probably be passing me somewhere on the back of the track or coming onto the front straight. Sure enough, one of the Audis came by me thru Turn 6 and I saw in my rearview mirror that the other one would get me just before Turn 7, which is the downhill leading onto the front straight.

As I began that downhill and was about to turn the nose of the Mustang in towards Turn 7's apex, I glanced to my right and back one last time to make sure it was clear. I saw the blur of another car approaching fast and held my line far to the left to make room, but it wasn't enough. The faster car hit my right side and then I was busy trying to hold the car on track and keep from spinning out. I was on the radio to Paul telling him that I'd been hit, when our cars made contact again and it was all over. The Mustang slid off the track onto wet grass and from then on, all I could do was hold on. Wet grass is like ice. As the back end of the car rotated around to the right and I skated down the hill towards the tire wall, I had just enough time to worry about it. I knew that with the speed I'd been carrying down the hill that it was going to be a hard hit. I hate being right all the time.

Just before my car slammed into the wall, I flinched and squeezed my eyes shut. Looking at the video tape later, you could see how the car's nose had gone into the tires sideways and the back end of the car lifted off the ground and hit with enough force to bounce it back off. Considering how hard the hit was, it's amazing that I was almost completely unharmed. The Mustang is so well built that the car absorbed an incredible amount of energy and protected me just as it's supposed to. I didn't even smack my head on the roll cage. My only damage was a sore tongue from where I'd bitten down on it. No blood though.

I was seeing red at that point anyway. I opened my eyes to see the damage done to my brand new, race car and I was pissed. I was yelling over the radio to Paul about it and told him over and over that I was so sorry, but I had nowhere to go. Watching the other cars continue to race by me on the track up the hill was really hard. I could feel angry tears stinging my eyes as the safety workers came up to help me out of the car. I'm pretty sure that I was ranting and raving rather incoherently as I was carried over to the safety car. That was when I saw who else was involved in the crash.

John Young's Saleen was stuffed nose first into the tire wall a few car lengths away from mine. It looked bad, but fortunately John looked unharmed. He was walking towards me with his helmet in one hand and a conflicted look on his face. I have no idea what he tried to say to me, but I do remember pointing at him and yelling, "You!!"

I was really surprised to see that it was John who'd hit me as it seemed from my perspective at that point to be a lousy move. I thought the other car had missed its braking point coming down the hill and would have slid off the track if I hadn't been there. It's hard to tell exactly what's happened when you're involved though and I wouldn't know for sure until I saw the tape later.

Whatever had happened, my weekend was over. I was cleared by the medical staff, but the passenger side of the Mustang was a mess. From the steering and suspension up front, all down the side of the car to the suspension and rear end at the back, the car was crushed. And that was exactly how I felt. It didn't help that my best friend, her husband, a bunch of Paul's friends and my mother were at the track that weekend to watch us race. Nothing to be done about it though. I knew that the car could be put back together and we'd probably make it to the Atlanta race a month later, but it was hard to sit thru the second GT race of the weekend. It wasn't easy on dad either. He'd cooked the motor in the Aero 8 on the 8th lap of the first race and it would be months before he'd be racing that car again.