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Jason's Blog
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Speed Touring Car Sebring - Round 1 Recap |
We arrived at Sebring simply happy to be there - the uncertaintly of the preceding months had made it all the sweeter to arrive and see a brace of bright blue Mazda6's parked in a row under the Tri Point awning; with our names on them. Charles, Eric and I rolled up Monday afternoon, and started with car fitment, setups, and stickers - making the cars ready for the practice day ahead. Tuesday dawned with the excitment of driving these amazing Touring Cars again! The test day went well, with all of us turning respectable laptimes. We all feared that some of the other teams were holding back a bit, but with our lack of testing time we didn't have that luxury.
To even get to the point where we had gone on track was a monumental task. Budget cuts had cost us full factory support. As soon as the budget deficiency was expressed, everyone kicked into overdrive trying to put together meaningful business deals and partnerships that would allow us to move forward. Several months of hard work have gotten us closer, but without a solid deal in place. Mazda stepped up and helped put the race within reach for us, needing a small portion to complete the budget. A group of special people came together to make it possible, stepping up with one-race sponsorship or coaching deals.
I sent out an email about 10 days before the event, asking for help... and within 22 hours, we had made our goal. It's such an amazing thing to see people pull together and help like that, and it made everything possible. A huge, heartfelt thank you to all those who made the effort to help out!
The Tri Point team had done a mega job of putting the cars together on short order, with the last minute nature of the program. It was a mattter of a couple of weeks before the event that we even knew it would be possible. The crew pulled together, and repaired/prepared the cars in a series of late nights at the Tri Point shop, then drove straight from Canoga Park, CA to Sebring, FL! A weary crew was relieved to see the drivers take to the track, and for the cars to perform as well as they did.
The Wednesday practice day dawned damp, and we took to a slightly slimy track. In the tricky conditions, I ended up first on the sheets, with Charles and Eric right behind in 4th and 6th. In the afternoon, some of the sand was released from the other cars' trunks and we dropped down the sheets a bit. For qualifying Thursday, we lined up with high hopes. The teammates lined up and made a run for it, the tires giving only one fast lap. We needed to get it right the first time, no second chance at it. The lap went well, probably about three-tenths of a second worth of mistakes - but in the end, we were over 6-tenths behind with Charles in 4th and myself another 2-tenths back in 5th. Eric had some engine issues, that turned out to be a faulty injector, and could only manage 12th.
One of the new rules for Speed World Challenge involves a coin-toss to decide whether or not to invert the top-5. So, I had a shot at the front row anyway! Pierre and I got up on the podium to decide it, and Pierre called tails... which is exactly what fell! There would be no grid change, unfortunately. That front row on Mazda6's would have been great!
In the race, unfortunately Charles' car exhibited a throttle body problem on the warm up lap, so we were already down a teammate. I started fourth, therefore, and maintained that for a while after the best TC start I've ever had. No wheelspin, no bogging, and immediately I was all over Wittmer in front of me. Eventually, after a few mistakes they pulled away and Chip Herr got around me. His motor expired on lap 5, promoting me back to 4th. I worked on Wittmer, closing the gap, and started to see his car slide around. My car was getting better and better, and I was just licking my chops to get up there and fight him for the podium. Eventually, however, as I closed in on him he lost all drive and I was through.
At that point I was several seconds behind Pierre, and it looked pretty bleak for getting 2nd place. Half of me hoped for a Mosport repeat and for Pierre and Thomas to get in some trouble, allowing me to fight for the win. However, whenever Pierre got close to Seth, he just pulled back away... obviously running a smart race and making it a good show. In the last few laps I REALLY started to haul in Peirre, and thought I might have a shot at it. When the white flag flew, I knew I wasn't close enough and backed off a bit. Unitl the radio call came in that it was flagged by mistake! There was yet another lap! I buckled back down and got after it, and drove my heart out for a lap and half. In the end, I got within 1.5 seconds of Pierre, and with another lap or two would have been all over him!
Overall, we were very pleased... Eric had come from 12th to 4th, and I had gotten on the podium. It was a great start to the season, and should go a long way toward keeping us in the Touring Car business for '09. We're looking toward ways to make NJ happen as we speak, and Mosport right after it. Look for more updates as the dates grow closer.
The Sebring race will be televised Tuesday, March 31st at 2:00PM Eastern time on SPEED!
-Jason
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Mosport TC Official Practice |
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Well, practice is behind us - and while the results look pretty bleak for the team, I at least feel fortunate in that we had an encouraging morning session and found a change that worked in the afternoon session. So, I'm reasonably cautiously optimistic heading into qualifying... Our cars seem to respond better to sticker tires, so for qualifying I think we'll show better than our practice times would suggest. I don't think we have a pole car (like we did the last two weekends,) but I do think we have a top-5 car. Hopefully we can be 3rd or 4th. I think qualifying out of the top-5 here is going to make the race tough... passing will be a challenge, especially with our slight torque deficiency. What does all this mean? Well, I'm not sure - our team is struggling. Jim and Charles are languishing at the back of the order. The cars are very similar on setup - so we just don't know why. The team has been staying late each day trying to figure it out - they have done wholesale changes, checked everything twice. It makes me proud to be associated with the team - but as team leader Craig says - the hard work is fine if something is found and the cars go better the next day. Here's hoping that happens tomorrow! Tune in to www.world-challenge.com for live timing - qualifying at 11:10AM ET. |
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Well, it's been since 2006 since I've driven here - and wow, this has got to be one of the most challenging tracks in North America. Driving the track in a Miata or MX-5 is one thing, but in the touring car this place is a handful! Literally, 10-20 more mph at every braking zone, meaning the car is much more unstable entering each corner. And, each corner is off-camber, downhill, uphill, or bumpy! The cars' pace is a bit off - we are not the fastest, and not the slowest - somewhere in the middle. We're working on the cars, making some changes. The guys found something on Charles' car and needed to stay late to change a whole bunch of suspension parts. They are doing amazing work for at-track repairs - hopefully it pays off and we have some pace tomorrow! I'll post an update tomorrow night, but you can watch the live timing feed for each practice session (11:10AM and 6:10PM,) at www.world-challenge.com Time for some rest! |
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So, as I thought - I was too busy to post anything at Road America. It was a great weekend, with a podium in the SpeedTC race, and with Ryan Schimsk winning the MX-5 Cup race for Team MER! I'll have full reports soon, but in the meantime I wanted to post a quick update. Look for full updates from Mosport this weekend - I love this track, and with two races to go it's time to kick into high gear to try to displace Acura from the manfacturer's points lead. |
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Mid Ohio TC Race, and Portland MX-5 Cup |
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So, after being quick in practice at Mid Ohio, I qualified third and finished fourth. I was running third until 4-laps to go, and I used my tires up trying to pass the Acuras ahead of me. Mazda is in a manufacturers battle with them, and we needed point. Mazda has done so much for me that I really tried my heart out to get past the Realtime cars. Tri Point gave me an awesome car all weekend long, we were faster than the competition, but we're down on torque. It's so hard to pass when the competitor can pull away off the corners. I can catch them back up by the next braking zone, but I only make up the gap - can't get close enough to pass. So I started driving really hard to stay close, which eventually did my tires in. Luckily my teammate was behind, so I didn't have to worry about defending my position. I eventually lost grip and went wide, and he went on to get third. Overall, a bit of a disappointment even though it was a good result and rebound for the team. We had a car that could get pole, I just didn't put the lap together. If we could have started up front, we could have won that race! I flew back to Texas Monday morning, and immediately hopped in the Team MER rig to head to Portland. We rolled off the truck pretty strong, with Eric, Ryan and Rob among the fastest in testing. We made some changes, and it wasn't working so we went drastically the other way for qualifying. Unfortunately, they didn't work and we ended up 4th, 10th and worse. Of course, now we had a good idea of where to go for setup. With some hard work from the team, and excellent engineering by Marc Miller, we had the fastest cars in the race. Once all the dust settled, we ended up 3rd, 4th and 8th - and Eric retained the points lead! Overall a good weekend, we need to get back to our winning ways at Road America! Next stop, my favorite track (I can say that about 5-6 tracks, but this is one of the highest.) Both Speed World Challenge and MX-5 Cup will be there - so I'll be busy! Stay tuned, I'll have live updates from the track in two weeks! |
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