DEMPSEY GONE?

"Depends," according to some observers at Barber Motorsports Park.

Following a primary sponsor's withdrawal from Dempsey Racing's No. 41 Mazda RX-8 program, Dane Cameron (left, hatless) and James Gué (right, in hat) won't drive in 2012 what they drove in 2011 despite having finished fourth in the Rolex Series' GT championship, 13-points shy of first place.

Thus the former two-car, full-season (emphasis on "full season," please) team now is down to one; presumably driving are Joe Foster, Patrick Dempsey and, probably, Charles Espenlaub as needed, as the team's principal drivers.

Dempsey Racing and Foster, who not only drives but is the administrative "brains" behind the team, were at Barber Motorsports Park, often being among the earliest to hit the track Monday when the various sessions commenced (pictured at below, left).

When the checkered flag fell on the Monday's final Rolex Series session of the two-day test, though, Foster and team struck the tent, jumped on the nearby I-20 eastbound ramp and headed for their Atlanta-area shop.

Before departing, Foster was enmeshed in an animated conversation with Grand-Am officials who promptly declined comment.

One nearby team's crew member wasn't as mum, claiming Foster at various times during the day expressed dissatisfaction with the new tire, saying that Foster (at right) felt it was better than what previously existed but fell short of the mark he wished to experience.

"What mark?" rhetorically grumbled yet another nearby GT competitor who's been in the thick of more than a few pitched points battles over recent years.

"What racer doesn't think tires can't be better? We always lack enough horsepower; always want the latest 'this' or the latest 'that.' Like golfers playing on a golf course, he (Foster) just needs to quit bellyaching about the clubs and focus on the fact that everyone else faces the same sand traps, too.

"If you ask me, either the team can't deal with the situation it's in or it's falling apart; one or the other. The tire just happens to a convenient excuse."

Noted is the turmoil that reportedly roiled within Dempsey Racing during the 2011 season, most particularly as it related to Cameron and Gué's No. 41 Mazda RX-8.

According to firsthand accounts, the team's behind-the-scenes performance at that time was deemed poor given the level of driving talent, only thrice cracking the top five (4,4,5) in nine starts.

Reportedly attributed to poor strategy calls, a sponsor's subtle requests for change evolved into a clear-cut demand for change, heeded just before the series landed at New Jersey Motorsports Park.

"What happened?" the Barber source asked rhetorically. "They finished on the podium at the very next race (NJMP) and kept on improving."

In the season's four remaining races, Gué and Cameron finished with three thirds and one sixth-place finish, averaging a 3.75-place finish as compared to a 7.375 average finish in the races prior to NJMP.

"2012 probably would've been a helluva good year for them if they had stayed around," the source continued.

"No one ever really wins in a sponsor versus owner face-off like they had over there because a sponsor doesn't generally get where he's at professionally unless he's competitive, too.

"You've got a team owner who's competitive but you can be sure that the sponsor's competitive, too. The difference is the sponsor's the one who's funding the team, man. He may be proved right or proved wrong but you've got to listen to him. You can't blow him off like he hasn't a clue as to how to win."

"You just don't find yourself taking something like that to the mat and then have everyone walk away with a warm and fuzzy feeling after that kind of deal. It was his (the sponsor's) ball to take home and he did."

Nevertheless, Dempsey Racing's No. 40 RX-8 (left, at Daytona) -- with Foster, Dempsey, Charles Espenlaub and Tom Long sharing the wheel -- made an early season statement on the 2011 Rolex 24 At Daytona podium, finishing a team-best third place in the race.

Unfortunately, it also was the team's final 2011 foray into a top-5 finish, averaging roughly an 11th-place average in the 11 races in which they scored points. Keeping the string intact, the No. 40 finished 11th in team points, seven spots behind a fourth place for the No. 41 team. In the GT driving championship, Foster finished 13th; Dempsey two places better in 11th.

Dempsey is a light year or two ahead of the driving ability he demonstrated just after the actor wrapped the movie "Made of Honor" and finally was free to run at the 2007 season's third race, ironically, at Barber Motorsports Park.

Dempsey's first intended 2007 race, the Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge (then Grand-Am Cup), occurring on the Friday preceding the Rolex 24 At Daytona, was preempted by Dempsey's desire to be at spouse Jillian Fink's side while she delivered twins Sullivan Patrick and Darby Galen on Feb. 1, 2007.

Outside of childbirth, in one of those darned if you do; darned if you don't rock-and-hard-place things, Dempsey's weak point was not getting enough seat time when conflicting were TV and movie shooting schedules which, as Dempsey has noted, provided the funds with which to seed Dempsey Racing.

Undertaking a concerted effort in 2011 to better himself -- often involving strenuous cross-country flights which are never particularly fun regardless of "cabin class" -- Dempsey competed more than he'd previously raced in a single season and it showed in his improved skill set, too.

So where's the team's weak spot?

It surely wasn't TV time, which aptly came shortly after Gunter Schaldach's No. 07 CoolTV, Leighton Reese-owned Chevrolet Camaro rammed Foster's No. 40 Mazda RX-8 at Road America, afterward making more newsreels than J.C. France and Chris Bingham's 2006 Mexico Hat Dance.

Also, Foster isn't exactly what one can describe as a shabby driver, by any measure.

In the 2011 Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge, Foster teamed with Scotty Maxwell (at right) in driving a top-of-the-line Ford Mustang Boss 302R prepared by Ford factory proxy Multimatic Motorsports -- Foster the opener; Maxwell the cleanup.

For the most part considered de rigueur in "team sportscar," especially insofar as sprint races are concerned, a team's "weakest link" usually starts a race (and in Grand-Am, the starter must qualify the car), followed by the "strongest" of the driving crew, who then theoretically can close a race providing the best possible results given the overall conditions.

Earning a series-leading three poles (tied with Rum Bum Racing's Nick Longhi) at Barber Motorsports Park, Lime Rock and Watkins Glen International, plus sitting on an additional four outside poles, Foster sat on the greater number of Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge front rows than did anyone in 2011.

Hobbled somewhat with a shoulder and neck injury following the Road America shunt, Foster still finished the 2011 season having compiled the third-greatest number of lead laps, 87, bested only by Matt Plumb (89) and Billy Johnson (108). Trailing Foster in the three following spots were the likes of Bill Auberlen (78), Longhi (49) and John Edwards (45).

Despite some criticism leveled at Dempsey at NJMP over SPEEDtv, the driver has more often than not received praise for his heads-up driving, generally transferring a reasonably positioned and "whole" car to teammate Foster, who closes when he's in the RX-8.

That the teamed averaged an 11th-place finish in GT seems at odds with potential, thus perhaps lending credence to the now-former sponsor's reported perspective.

Dempsey Racing is looking to run two cars in the 50th-anniversary Rolex 24 At Daytona (Jan. 29-30), reportedly having most, if not all the available seats filled. As of now, the team will halve that car count for the remainder of 2012.

Later,

DC