Porsche
250 Presented by Bradley Arant
at
Barber Motorsports Park
July
31, 2005
The eighth race on Grand Am's
Rolex Series calendar is at Barber Motorsports Park, in Alabama.
At this race last year, Cory and Leh took our second straight podium
finish in the SGS category. The GT class this year is much tougher
than in past seasons, and the BMW's and GTO.R's were going to be very
difficult to beat, as the course does not favor Porsches.
The
#14 GT3 Cup driven by Leh Keen and Cory Friedman entered this race tied
for second in Team Championship Points, and we were looking to solidify
our position in the top three. The #94 car was driven by Rolex
Series regular Paul Mortimer and accomplished Club Racer Patrick Small,
an Alabama local.
There was a Test Day on
Thursday, which we used to get the cars mostly sorted. In the
first official practice, the 14 car was firmly within the top 10, and we
moved up to 5th in the second practice. For qualifying, some minor
handling issues left Keen a second off the pole-sitting BMW, which in
the tight GT field was only good enough for 11th. Paul Mortimer
would start the race 23rd.
All weekend we
were dealing with incredible heat and humidity during the day, and rain
in the afternoon. The race started at noon and would run until
3PM, so rain was certainly a possibility in the latter stages of the
race. Mortimer had a good run moving the #94 up through the field
steadily, sitting in 18th position by the half-hour mark. Leh was
struggling trying to overtake an overpowered 57 Corvette.
This was made even more difficult, as yellows came out very regularly
early on. In the first 1:30 of the race, half of the laps
circulated under a double-yellow. The track was green for only
about 4 laps at a time. One of these yellows unfortunately was
caused by an incident with the 94 car. On lap 20, the 71 car
locked-up under braking for the hairpin and had a spectacular collision,
which knocked the 71 car out of the race and left 94 in the
gravel. The car was finally dragged out and was able to drive to
pit lane under its own power. The mangled quarter was rubbing the
wheel slightly, but upon re-entering the track, the car seemed to be
fine, as lap times suffered only slightly. Ultimately, the
incident dropped 94 back 3 laps.
The
consistent yellows were not a surprise, so most teams expected the race
to go to the 2:45 time limit rather than 250 miles. Some teams
opted for a bold one-stop strategy that was dependant on cautions
throughout the entire race. If there was significant green-flag
racing, this strategy would require a catastrophic late-race splash of
fuel. We chose a more conservative strategy with an early splash
and driver change comfortably within range of the end of the race.
The splash dropped Keen back to 15th in class, but he circulated only
about 20 seconds behind the class leader at the 1:00 mark. 94 hit
the track 21st in GT.
A caution just over an
hour in virtually eliminated our chance for a podium. The DP
leader was working its way through the GT field when the yellow
dropped. This allowed the top 4 GT cars to pick up nearly a full
lap on the rest of the field. At the half-way mark of the race the
fifth caution came out, this was excellent timing for the one-stop
teams. Wit h1:15 to go, Leh was 5th with little chance of
advancing. We still needed to make another stop, but if the track
were to stay predominantly green for the duration, it would have worked
out very well for us and we likely would have retained at least 5th position.
The
last 1:10 had only two cautions, but they both hurt us badly. The
first lasted about 15 minutes and gave the teams that risked a one-stop
some breathing room. Both of our cars made stops and driver
changes during the long caution. When racing resumed, Cory had
lost a lap to the class leaders and was running 13th. Patrick
piloted the 94 car which had moved up into 20th position. The
final double-yellow came out just past the 2:00 mark. This was
very short, but it allowed Andrew Davis (who instructs at the Porsche
Driving Experience at Barber) to get back into the 73 car. With
about 40 minutes left in the race, there was intermittent sprinkles, but
rains never went on the cars. Friedman fought his way up to 10
position, but lost a spot to the 73 car. After a very long battle,
Cory overtook and put distance on the 88 car. With 4 laps
remaining, he also passed the 23 car and took 9th in GT. The 94
car had a strong effort despite the early problems and finished
19th. All of the cars that attempted one stop made the finish, but
it must have been close, as the #21 BMW took the checkered flag coasting
down pit lane. We expect that had the race gone 2 more laps, we
would have picked up a few more positions.
Only
the top 3 GT cars were on the lead lap, which they picked up on an early
wave-by, and 4th-12th were all on the same lap. Our strategy did
not work out perfectly this race, but it did not hurt us too badly, as
all the cars ahead of us at the end also out-qualified us and turned
faster race laps. We are not terribly happy with top-10 finishes
but are content to be the third fastest Porsche. The 26 car GT
field had 16 GT3 Cup cars, but only 3 of the Porsches managed to finish
in the top 10.
In the season standings, The
16 BMW has moved very close to the 80 Porsche for the class title.
Last year's SGS champions in the 65 car, who started in a Porsche but
moved to the GTO.R and the 73 Porsche have moved ahead of us by only 1
point. We now sit 4th in team points, and Cory and Leh hold 5th in
the driver standings.
The next race is teh
second of three Watkins Glen races. This one on the short NASCAR
course. We hope that this fast course will show a bit more parity
to the Porsches and we can make up some lost ground in the standings. |
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