World
Challenge Race - Round 1
Sebring International Raceway
17-19 March 2004
55
and Counting...
Prior
to this weekend, I had completed approximately 21 laps around Sebring
International Raceway. That was over a four day race weekend in
2001 in my Ferrari 355 F1 Challenge car. That included the actual
race which was 18 laps long. Obviously, we'd had some problems that
weekend. They culminated in my spending most of the race stuck in
4th gear. It's a long way around Sebring in 4th gear. Especially
when your windshield wipers come on all by themselves, you lose
your ABS and your warning lights go on and off for no particular
reason. My favorite was having my oil pressure warning light stuck
on for half the race. I couldn't stop staring at the gauge after
that to be sure that I wouldn't miss something while I was ignoring
the faulty light. You'd think that this would all be ancient history
though. After all, it was three years ago in a totally
different car than I drive now. The problem was that those 21 laps
constituted the extent of my experience at Sebring, a very long,
notoriously bumpy and technically challenging track and Sebring
was the track that World Challenge would be starting the 2004 season
on.
Despite
my lack of experience at this difficult track, I was still excited
to get back to racing. We did a lot of testing during the off season
and the car was not only fabulous, but was better and better everytime
we took her out. And I'm improving, too. I feel more in tune with
the car and better able to communicate to Paul what's going on while
I'm driving. I'm still learning, but things have definitely improved.
When he makes suspension adjustments, I respond to them and can
provide feedback as to whether they are positive or negative. He
finds it puzzling that even when my times come down after a change,
there is still a chance that I won't like it. I have this weird
preference for oversteer versus understeer.
The
Mustang was doing so well that the last time we were out at Willow
Springs testing, my car was the fastest on the track. We were out
there with a bunch of guys from Viper Days and there were a number
of Comp Coupes similar to cars that will be competing in World Challenge
this year. The Mustang handled better than it ever has and I was
comfortable and confident driving it. With that happy memory in
mind, I headed on track for the first practice session of the test
day at Sebring.
I
was bedding in new front brake pads, so I wasn't using them fully,
but that gave me a chance to take a look around anyway. I was reassured
that the track at least looked familiar to me. Sebring is 3.7 miles
long and has 17 turns. That's a lot to remember. One thing that
nobody forgets is how uneven and bumpy the circuit is. Sebring is
built on an old, military airport. The track surface was not specifically
designed for automobile racing. That may be putting it mildly as
it felt like my car had no place on this track during the first
session. It didn't feel anything like the perfectly balanced car
that I remembered from testing at Willow.
It
was humid and rainy that first day, but was supposed to clear up
for the rest of the week. I was grateful for that as the World Challenge
race was almost rained out last year when dad ran his Morgan. The
second test session did get canceled due to rain, so that left only
one more chance to get on track that evening. It didn't go very
well.
Since
it was late in the day, the sun was setting and I couldn't see the
entrance to Turn 17 at all. The whole way down the back straight,
the sun was right in my eyes. I pretty much had the general track
configuration down, but I was still nailing down braking points
and apexes and with the sun in my eyes, it didn't look like I was
going to improve my times any. I also just didn't feel comfortable
in the car. I couldn't figure out if it was suddenly handling badly
or if it was just that the track was so bumpy and I was unfamiliar
with it. Either way, Paul told me that I was going to have to be
at least 5 seconds faster. I figured that I would need to do even
better than that.
At
least I had someplace quiet and dry to rest, think about the course
and study a track map. Sebring was the first race that we took our
new truck and trailer to. The trailer holds three cars and all our
equipment. There is a lift inside which allows the crew to more
easily work underneath cars if they have to trackside. The new truck
is the best part though. It's actually a motorhome. Not only is
there room inside for a pull out bed, a full bathroom, a small kitchen,
a flat screen TV and PlayStation2, but the whole thing is fully
accessible for me. Thanks to our latest sponsor, Ricon Corporation,
I can get in and out of the motorhome completely independently.
And the wheelchair lift itself
is awesome. It's fast and it's quiet and it even looks rather high
tech. I can't say enough about how great it is to be able to come
and go as I please in my own truck.
Wednesday
was the official practice day for World Challenge. We only got two
sessions on track and neither of them went particularly well for
me. During the first session I dropped a wheel off track in Turn
14 just before the curbing and dinged a wheel and then I went wide
thru 15 and came back on track over the curbing which tore up my
front splitter. What a waste. It was brand new and I'd just put
all the decals on it.
I
also had a hairy moment in Turn 1. I went into it a bit too hot,
tried to steer into the slide, but couldn't drive out of it. I saw
the wall on the inside coming up and decided that stopping before
that was a good idea. Unfortunately, I ended up stopped facing that
wall with the car dead in first gear. Now, for those of you who
are unfamiliar with Sebring, let me stress that this is a decidedly
unfortunate place to end up. Turn 1 is a blind corner and it's fast.
I was stopped directly at the apex of the corner where cars would
shoot thru at over 100 mph. I have to admit that my heart was pounding
a bit in my chest as I moved to get the car out of there as quickly
as possible. At one point I looked up and saw one of the Audis coming
directly at me. I'm usually a bit jealous of Galati's abilities
on track, but at that moment I was grateful for his skill and reaction
time as he dodged to his right to avoid t-boning my car. A second
car made the same move around me, but I was too busy restarting
the Mustang and maneuvering it out of there to make note of who
it was. Many thanx to that driver as well though.
Before
heading back on track for the second practice session, I thought
it might help me to talk to a more experienced driver to get some
advice on this track. Phil McClure is one of the nicest guys you'll
meet at a World Challenge race. He's also one of the fastest drivers.
I'm no Corvette fan, but his race car has one of the sweetest sounding
engines I've ever heard. And it's hella fast. Anyway, I was hoping
that Phil would have a few moments to spare and as luck would have
it, he did. I whipped out a track map and asked him if he could
talk me thru a lap. It was reassuring that some of the direction
that he gave me was in line with what I was already doing and I
planned on making good use of everything else he told me.
During
the second session, I did pick up some time, but then my transmission
started to give me some problems. I got three or four shift refusals
when I made the request for an upshift into fourth gear.
With
the ASM system, it's referred to as a "request for shift"
when you click the thumb switches for the up or down shifts. The
computer controlling the transmission, or transmission control unit
(TCU), can "refuse the shift" if any of the many sensors
on the car find something outside of very specific parameters established
to ensure a safe gear shift. For instance, if I request a downshift
when I am in third gear and the engine is spinning at 6000 rpm,
the car will refuse that request because the downshift into second
would cause the engine to over rev. That's the most common occurrence.
The car will also refuse an upshift for various reasons and in this
case, it was refusing to shift to
fourth when the car was under load. If I shortshifted then there
was no problem. That didn't help any though, as either way, my times
weren't good for the final practice session.
It
was an interesting day anyway. What with learning a new track and
getting to know all the new teams and drivers. On paper, it looked
like I was faster than Stu Hayner, but after talking to some of
his crew members, I couldn't get too puffed up over that. It seems
that his car is brand, spankin' new. It had never set rubber to
asphalt before coming to Sebring, so they fully expected him to
move up the grid in the next few days. I didn't see any reason to
argue with them, the car looked great.
Speaking
of good looking cars... the Cadillacs were pretty impressive. Well,
to be honest, I don't find them particularly appealing visually,
but they make quite the presentation. You'd be hard pressed to find
an ALMS team that is better prepared. On track, the Cadillacs themselves
are almost cute. They're slammed so low to the ground, they look
practically miniature. They're as fast as everyone feared they would
be too, but Pilgrim and Angelelli are absolute gentlemen on the
track. Every move they make is smooth as silk and when they make
a pass, it's like a hot knife thru butter. They're gone almost before
you know they're there.
The
bar has been raised to an unprecedented level.
With
that well in mind, back in my paddock, it was decided that the gearbox
in the Mustang needed to be swapped out. It was possible that the
synchros for fourth gear were done and that was what the shifting
problems were. That's not actually an unusual problem. Well, you
don't usually find synchromesh gearboxes in race cars as the forces
put thru them can shred your typical synchro rather quickly. They
aren't typically made to shift as fast and hard as they would be
in a race car. Considering that, the fact that the Tremec gearbox
had lasted thru over 70 hours of hard, race use was very impressive.
The
next day, I was faster during qualifying, but not fast enough. The
transmission was flawless, but the rest of the car just didn't feel
right. I still felt like I was all over the place. The car was squirrelly
under braking and it was bouncing around so much in general that
it was tough to be smooth on the throttle. In the end, my times
weren't good enough to meet qualifying.
Before
the race the next day, I thought it would be a good idea to talk
to another driver. Figuring that I couldn't get too much good advice,
I went looking for Randy Pobst. The Audi paddock was close by and
Randy has always been nice enough to take time with me. And take
time he did. I asked him if he could go over a track map with me
and he spent about 15 minutes giving me detailed instructions on
the proper way to lap Sebring. As I headed back to my paddock to
suit up for the race, I was hoping that I would put that information
to good use.
It
was a bit later than I thought, so Paul took the car down to pre-grid
ahead of me, then dad and I followed in the golf cart after I was
suited up. Watching everyone lining up, it occurred to me that this
was a rather unusual grid. I expected only one or two cars to start
behind me, but there were more than that and it was an intimidating
bunch. One of the McCann brothers and the rookie driving one of
Giglotti's cars were gridded last because they had no times during
qualifying. Added to that, John Young's times had been DQ'd due
to a minor, technical infraction and Giglotti had to start at the
back because he had been hit by a Porsche during qualifying, sending
him off in a spin and flat spotting his tires. The rules say that
you can change one tire between qualifying and the race, but anything
more than that and you start at the back. And then the cars directly
in front of me were manned by no less than the 2001 series champion,
Jeff McMillin, and by Trans-Am pro, Stu Hayner. I was surrounded
by a ton of talent. I knew most of those guys would outdo me by
the end of the race, but I figured the start might be rather interesting.
McMillin
was actually next to me on the grid and the rookie in the other
PTG built BMW was directly ahead of me. I didn't want to get in
McMillin's way, but I fully expected to get the jump on the rookie
at the start. Nothing against him at all, I've just done well on
the standing starts and I had a good feeling about this one. Sure
enough, the lights went out, the green flag dropped and it was like
the Bimmer in front of me was standing still. One of the corner
workers told me later that it looked like my car had literally turned
sideways in place and then leaped forward between the cars in front
of me. I was past
four or five cars and into third gear before I knew it. Unfortunately,
that was as far as I got. Young's Saleen appeared in front of me
as we approached Turn 1 and then Groom's Porsche and as all the
cars got bunched up together, I got jostled backwards. I'm afraid
I gave up the corner.
Well,
there was nothing to do about it at that point, but put my head
down and dig in. I hung with the pack for a few laps and put in
my best lap time of the week on the third or fourth lap, a 2:22.
I was faster, but I still felt like I was struggling with the car
and around lap six or seven, I lost it going thru Turn 5. I ended
up on the outside of the turn and a cloud of dirt came thru the
cockpit. Once I was back on the track, it didn't take long to realize
there was a problem. Dirt had gotten into the hand controls and
the throttle wasn't moving as smoothly as it should. I radioed in
that I was going to have to pit. I brought the car in and Paul squirted
brake cleaner over the controls to clean them out. My visor was
up, so I ended up with a mouthful, but figured it was a small price
to pay to get back in the race.
After
I headed back on track, I realized that I had made another mistake.
This one was in underestimating how hot it was going to be during
the race. Since it started at 4:30 in the afternoon and the day
had seemed fairly cool anyway, I had opted not to wear my coolsuit
during the race. Bad decision. I hadn't taken into account what
a difference the breeze was making in the apparent temperature.
Inside the car, wearing three layers of Nomex and a Kevlar helmet,
I didn't enjoy the benefits of that breeze and the heat was getting
to me. It wasn't severe enough for me to bring the car back in,
but it was enough to slow me down and my times showed it.
I
decided that since I wasn't going to win this one and wasn't going
to be able to put in any blistering times because of the heat, that
I would back off a click or two and work on my line. I was still
struggling with it as the car just didn't seem to want to listen
to me. I was having trouble turning the nose in, but was having
equal difficulties keeping the back end properly behind me. I put
two wheels off on the exits of Turns 5, 7 and 16 more than once.
I felt like I was braking too early everywhere because the car felt
so unstable
during braking, but then I was still going too fast around corners
and sliding around a lot. I wouldn't recommend that kind of driving,
but I bet the crowd found it entertaining.
In
the end, Cadillac finished 1-2 which was impressive considering
the fact that Pilgrim had stalled at the start, fallen all the way
to the back of the pack and had to fight his way back up to the
front. I finished 25th overall, which was rather disappointing as
we had higher hopes than that going into the weekend. Looking on
the bright side, not only did I finish in front of him, but I'm
tied in points with the series champion, Randy Pobst. I'd love to
say that it's because of the great coaching he gave me before the
race and how well I put his advice into action, but... I suppose
I should be honest and point out
the fact that he lost his power steering on the very first lap,
pitted around the 10th and struggled to bring the car home after
that. Still, it certainly sounds impressive for only having a few
dozen laps on this track, doesn't it?
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