A PORSCHE 250 POSTSCRIPT OR TWO

 

Foremost is this correspondent’s humbled self, highly appreciative of the applause which supplanted an expected guffaw but also derailed another following line: “Mark Raffauf, you’re fired!” Of course, neither the delivered line nor dialogue lost had any official weight. Knowing those who attended, though, the “Raffauf” line was expected to elicit the actual applause line (if not hoots, etc.), even though we all dearly love Marcus. Yet, one later got the distinct impression Joe Sahlen wasn’t terribly impressed. No matter, Sahlen’s meats still are the best, anywhere, and some in the paddock sorely missed their usual presence, along with Buddy & Co. (Really, dinky motel muffins don’t get it; often not even offered with really cheap beds). Nevertheless: a very sincere “Thank You” to those who rapidly and repeatedly put hand to hand. Next time, though, just laugh, please. But yours truly was, well, truly humbled.

ON WITH THE, UM, RACE?

As of this being written Barber Motorsports Park has an anonymous “race” survey link that allows some venting, as needed. So have at it.

Mike Forest (No. 8 Corsa Car Care BMW-Riley) and Mark Wilkins (No. 61 Pacific Mobile Ford-Riley) were two of  2010’s previously unseen “Out-Front” drivers who showed some stuff at Barber Motorsports Park’s April 10, 2010, Porsche 250. Other than Ricky Taylor (more below), only David Donohue would lead the race other than those of Chip Ganassi Racing With Felix Sabates’ Blue Beast,  under the direction of Tim Keene (left).

It’s a heckuva thing to say but the last hour’s worth of Rolex Series racing in the Porsche 250 – save Memo Gidley’s nip, nip, nipping everyone’s heels (below right) but especially Ryan Dalziel’s – with 31 final laps under green was downright next-to-boring, even if six cars finished on the lead lap.

Yet, one has come to expect closer finishes in Grand-Am competition.

Given the date change and therefore a potentially different crowd on hand, one hoped to see exactly that for which the Rolex Series has become much noted: two and three cars engaged in a front-of-field mad scramble for victory.

As it was, Scott Pruett – with a most excellent earlier , 26-leading laps assist from co-driver Memo Rojas – kept the No. 01 TELMEX Dinan BMW-Riley Daytona Prototype at the front and won with a 6-second margin of victory over second place; which came in with a 10-second margin over third; which came in with a 2-second margin over a hustling Gidley, who led a three-car group (in which were David Donohue and Buddy Rice) having a two-second tighter margin than that separating first and second.

Lost mostly to all but the TV crowd (and due only to a camera’s focus being somewhat singular), the GT class provided a tight fight at the end, albeit a graying, crippled Sylvain Tremblay was doing all he could to beat a healthy, strapping young Jordan Taylor (left) to the line for second place in what the public – if not just an on-air SPEEDtv commentator – increasingly perceives as the “Mazda Class.”

Between some race-traffic shuffling, co-driver Todd Lamb getting in and climbing out, Jordan Taylor (it’s gonna be a long, long time before “Taylor” will again be seen herein without another name stuck in front of it) went from second to second. Sounds boring, but as much as Tremblay and his SpeedSource No. 70 Castrol Mazda RX-8 at race end was doing all he could to overtake Racers Edge Motorsports’ No. 30 3-Dimensional.com Mazda RX-8, Jordan Taylor was doing all he could to stay ahead. Emil Assentato (click on Emil’s link and you’ll see and hear Assentato narrate last year’s VIR qualifying run. Be prepared for some highly technical language, though, especially his “get the heck out of here”) and Jeff Segal earned their second win of the 2010 season in SpeedSource’s No. 69 FXDD Mazda RX-8.

CH-CH-CH-CH-CHANGES

However, with Mazda’s having now won four of the last seven Rolex Series GT races, one just knew the axe was bound to fall, and did on Wednesday with Technical Bulletin No. 2010-04 which presented a number of changes to cars competing in the Rolex Series GT and Continental Tire classes.

Taking originally issued 2010 rules into account, for two GT-cars weight (the guys in the paddock like to say “ballast”) was: upped by 75 lb. for Mazda; upped 50 lb. for Corvettes having DP axles and IRS (at first, given the timing, one might’ve . . . actually probably did think “Infernal Revenue Service,” but in this case is an abbreviation for “Independent Rear Suspension” – rules-book writers preferring to keep yahoos like yours truly “in the dark” with buzzwords or, in this case, abbreviations without a cross-referencing glossary. However, rule writers do it differently).

Insofar as the Mazda RX-8s are concerned, the guys who must now climb even harder up the points ladder – if not  race finishes – include Patrick Dempsey Racing’s No. 40 (Joe Foster, Patrick Dempsey) and No. 41 (James Gué, and 2009 GT-class champ Leh Keen) RX-8s (right).

Sitting On Top Of The World (an excellent example of Eric Clapton’s early guitar skills being found therein) points-wise, if not weight-wise are the aforementioned (way up there, somewhere) Tremblay and that “new” guy, Jonathan Bomarito (below), who seems immensely capable of dispatching any track at which he qualifies. It’d be nice to see Bomarito and Jordan Taylor go one-on-one more frequently (no offense meant, Jonathon, for using “Jordan” – as mentioned elsewhere, there’s just too many “Taylor” surnames running round the paddock but only one “Bomarito”).

Yet, somehow sitting second in points (only five points behind Tremblay and Bomarito) and yet entirely unaffected (directly or overtly so) by the latest competition revision are Georgian Andrew Davis and Scotsman Robin Liddell (an eerie, almost twin-like resemblance taken into account, the Stevenson Motorsports No. 57 BryanMark Financial Camaro’s drivers’ nationalities were included so as to provide a hint used by motorsports writers in helping easily distinguish the two).

Having been given the green light to re-hire or employ new staff to cover the flood of Porsche’s returning to Grand-Am (given lost momentum; sometime between the fall of 2010 and the 2011 Rolex 24 At Daytona), PMNA (Porsche Motorsports North America) and Alwin Springer benefit from selling presumably larger-displacement engines, considering no hard reference to engine size exists in Grand-Am’s “GT Regulations 2010 Rule Book” (as of 12/17/2009)(give or take).

In the meantime, Dr. Jim Lowe (assuming an accord has been reached with Springer) has played his cards fairly well, having incurred little expense (that noise you hear would be Jim Pace and Lowe falling from respective chairs) from the Rolex 24 until now.

Despite teething problems of which they likely have overcome by now, the No. 44 Magnus Racing Porsche (drivers Craig Stanton, John Potter) has a firm grip on the Porsche-faithful standings. Though it’s probable Stanton and Potter will move up from their current 10^th-place in points, it’d take a major rollover from everyone above them to perhaps even reach the top-5.

ZOOM-ZOOMING ALONG

Yes, while seven Mazdas were in Barber’s Porsche 250’s field of 16 GT cars, they also battled six GMs (two Camaros and four Corvettes), one of which being driven by 2008 GT champ Paul Edwards (left), whose driving exhibition put on a whale of a show before three cars into one line equaled two off.

Edwards’ ride, Banner Racing’s No. 07 Las Vegas Bikefest/Mobil 1, was handed to him by co-driver and Motorcycle Great, Scott Russell (Motorcycle Hall of Fame) who put in his best Rolex Series qualifying run to date.

Still, maybe those who are inclined toward “Mazda” derision have forgotten, perhaps even overlooked decades of past sportscar fields of which fully half or more were regularly comprised of Porsches. Indeed, the IMSA of old was in large part disposed of reintroducing prototype racing in the U.S. due to the sheer weight of entry list ink alone expended on reproducing “Porsche” time and again.

Yet, what happened? Porsche comes back and, by the mid-80’s, had populated the field with its 962 – which wouldn’t have been built if not for the insistence of John Bishop and Mark Raffauf.

Assuredly, Porsche by that point had refined at least one page torn from Henry Ford II’s book on racing: flooding a given field with one particular nameplate provided a greater chance of claiming victory. Porsche’s notable refinement of “The World According To Henry; I’m Gonna Get You Enzo” was mostly in selling its race cars to others instead of itself solely picking up the race tab.

Yet, one cannot at the same time conveniently overlook Porsche’s repeatedly demonstrated reality: build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to that builder’s door.

That which Porsche did then is what Mazda is now doing. As demonstrated above, Porsche’s got enough muscle to reverse a trend politically or otherwise, the latter at this point being questionable inasmuch as it appears to have successfully invested aplenty in making others “The Bad Guys.”

FREIGHTTRAINS or lack thereof (other than Zoom-Zoom)

As the race wound down, deflated were various balloons of hope of those expecting all heck to break loose had only Ozz Negri’s (at far left with John Pew) No. 60 Crown Royal Ford-Riley DP somehow closed completely on Pruett’s No. 01 TELMEX BMW-Riley. (BTW: should the reader think the preceding unwieldy, try “Oswaldo Negri, Junior’s Michael Shank Racing No. 60 Crown Royal Extra Rare XR Roush Yates Engines Riley Technologies Mk XXII Daytona Prototype with John Pew”)

Negri and Pruett dicing at race end would’ve itself been worth the price of admission. Especially keeping in mind Mike Shank’s pre-race team lecture: “We aren’t going to take it anymore; get a fender, give a fender” (or something to that effect).

Translated: “We’re tired of being a Mr. Nice Guy having fast race cars but who gets creamed by others. If anything, we’re gonna be the creamers instead of the creamees and take ourselves out before anyone else gets the chance” (or something to that effect).

Well, okay, while conceding the above probably is open to interpretation, one also remembers a time when Negri wasn’t at all shy about putting a fender on anyone (ask Christian Fittipaldi). Then again, that was around the same time when Max Papis and Jan Magnussen played “Drill This Car” (poor Jan, it seems everyone drills him at one time or another) or when David Donohue’s doors (yep, plural) frequently flew open as he and Terry Borcheller duked it out at Phoenix. Or J.C. France (soon) and Chris Bingham tangled mano-a-mano en el Autódromos Hermanos Rodríguez del Cuidad México DF.

The English way of civilized racing – with leather gloves, flowing scarves and near-worthless but cute hats – is terribly overstated. Give me Cale, Donnie and Bobby throwing this and that in Turn-3 any day – as long as yours truly isn’t actually caught up in it, of course. They do it in hockey, football and even baseball for gosh sakes.

Which brings us back to the lack of “debris flags” (a misnomer in general context as applied to road racing) flying on this side of NASCAR’s fence, even though actually displaying such may be in a race promoters’ and spectators’ interest and even if they don’t know it. (Sound familiar? Hint: “national scale”)

It’s a given that the Pruett, Rojas and the Ganassi fan base were happy to see the TELMEX team win. It’s also a given that fans of fifteen other DPs weren’t happy and likely at one point, any point hoped for a “bunching of the field” for a final shootout.

It’s a “my guy” kind of thing but, nonetheless, if some sort of overt action gathered the field at the end it’d still put all who watched on seat edges – even the Chip Ganassi with Felix (de donde es José?) Sabates fans. In this case, had Pruett gone on to win (and who, other than Juan Pablo Montoya, might think he wouldn’t . . . okay, maybe Pew and Shank and Claudia Negri) then all would’ve been “right” with the universe. If Pruett hadn’t prevailed, then all still would’ve been right with the universe, except from the TELMEX fans’ perspective, of course. Yet, 15 is greater than 1 in most mathematics courses – and that’s the number which should’ve been ultimately served. (The Big Gorilla with his second Paul Reed Guitar, at right)

The single greatest danger to all (short of terrorists and, perhaps, those who trash Constitutional concepts) – from fans in the stands, to television ratings, to series participation and to a series itself – is a runaway points race so early in the season. Man, if one is going to hassle with plane changes in Hartsfield and sleeping in strange places having weird noises, then provide a reason for undertaking such. Boredom doesn’t count didley for anyone, save Henry David Thoreau.

BOOM, BOOM, BOOM, BOOM – OUT GO THE LIGHTS?

Enough said.

 

TURNING BACK THE CLOCK ONE DAY

Friday’s Barber Motorsports Park qualifying session stirred the same-oh, same-oh mix just a tad and announced the arrival of some newer characters. Like Ricky Taylor, some have been around and are entering a new phase of self-belief mixed with proper machinery. Others, Like Kasper Andersen, are just showing up. Some might say it’s a “changing of the guard,” but yours truly won’t be so cheap to at all use that cliché.

Surely you’ve read all about it: Ricky Taylor scored the Porsche 250 DP pole in record-setting fashion, then at race-start absolutely hauled buggy in his SunTrust No. 10 Ford-Dallara (below, right) though such was likely motivated as much by fear of the unknown as anything. Ricky Taylor recorded the race’s second-fastest DP lap, bettered only by SunTrust co-driver Max Angelelli.

Perhaps the more surprising part of Ricky Taylor’s 47 laps is that he didn’t commit an error of negatively impacting magnitude (with all due respect to SunTrust’s James Wells, though, that’s where the team’s good luck ended) because Angelelli took care of that when he did a banzai move (really, watch the wheels on the video, Max) on an already turning Ryan Dalziel and his No. 8 Corsa Car Care BMW Riley.

Unfortunately, the SunTrust car got the worst part of that deal. That Dalziel didn’t experience harm sufficient enough to keep he and co-driver Mike Forest (who is getting to be one darn good DP driver) and their Starworks BMW-Riley from the podium is probably more surprising.

In same qualifying session as that of Ricky Taylor’s, while in the McDonald’s No. 77 Ford-Doran, oops, Dallara, Dion Von Moltke pushed the limits once again – which is what racers are supposed to do, if one is to believe someone like Bill Riley, that is – and paid a relatively mild price for having done so. The car had only a race day warm-up lap in a test of a new front-end suspension courtesy of Von Moltke, but he and Gidley teamed for one of the best runs Doran Racing has had in awhile. Just after race start Von Moltke was “Taylored” (a verb, “to Taylor” is defined as: “An experienced racer, usually Darren Law, intentionally and firmly nudges a young upstart’s door, formerly Ricky Taylor, so as to advise the latter of an older, gray-haired racer’s presence, if not make ‘em pee their pants”; synonyms include, “check,” “bump” and “punt”).

Gidley’s understandably high on Von Moltke and the chemistry is good between the two. At some point this season the two will climb onto the podium, if not its top step. (On second thought: Gidley’s always “high” – on life, dummies. Or would that be Muscle Milk? Post-race, at the opposite end of the paddock from the team’s hauler a sweat-drenched Gidley climbed from the McDonald’s car. Gidley: “Man, that car’s hot! My cool suit didn’t work, my helmet’s blower stopped working and my water bottle ran out 15-minutes before race ended. Man, I need some liquids.” A journalist walking alongside just happens to have a bottle of water and offers it to Gidley. Gidley: “Nah, I don’t drink that stuff,” and didn’t. At that moment one was tempted to posit, “Okay, so you’re in the Gobi Desert . . .”)

A second Starworks car, with former NASCAR Camping World Truck Series and, before that, sportscar guy Bill  Lester (left) was teamed with Great Dane Kasper Andersen in the No. 7 Xtreme Karting/Flex Box BMW Riley. A late-Friday conversation with Andersen revealed he wasn’t all too sure about as yet “getting” the DP thing but it was clear Bill Lester is. First, he said he was. Second, he showed it Saturday with a couple of really slick passes in difficult places. “It’s taken me about two years longer than I would’ve liked or thought it would, but I’m finally getting the hang of it,” Lester said Thursday before the race.

 

BLAME GAME

In the end, blame it all on Raffauf for failing to throw a debris, um, caution flag to collect something from someplace or someone (hell, it could’ve been bubble gum from the Pirelli Girls for all I care). Had the flag been thrown, the field would’ve bunched, Ozz would’ve taken out Pruett and Max would’ve taken out three or four others and the Spirit of Daytona (at front, right) would’ve finished out front.

Later,

DC