TEST DAY

Turner Motorsports decided not to do the Thursday test day so I was able to focus all my attention on the Porsche. We had two sessions. In the first session I was able to turn a 1:27.1 right off the trailer, which seemed a little quicker than what we were seeing from the other GT cars although there were no official times on the test day.

I thought the car seemed pretty good, but the rear of the car felt unsupported at the entry to corners, particularly when I was hard on the brakes. It also felt a little sloppy in the transition sections known as madness at Mid-Ohio.

We tried some changes to springs, shocks and shock pressures to support the rear of the car, which seemed to help, but I never got a clean lap in the session so we couldn't confirm the improvement on the watch.

PRACTICE AND QUALIFYING

Friday morning when I arrived at the track Rodger Hawley informed me that one of the rear anti-roll bar mounts was broken, which accounted for everything I had been complaining about the previous day. We decided to leave the spring change in the car, but set the shocks back where we had started. The car was fantastic during the one and a half hour morning session. I turned a 1:26.7 and got out of the car feeling like it had a lot more. At the time we were the quickest GT car, but we fell to third by the end of the session.

Next I drove the Turner BMW for the first time. I could tell right away that it was a great car, but the setup was a little off. The team's baseline setup was patterned around their experience at Mid-Ohio in their World Challenge cars. It seemed like a good place to start, but the cars were just too different for it to work. The car was too stiff in the rear and throttle on oversteer was a big problem.

The next practice session was in the Porsche. I didn't drive the car in the second session because Joe Policastro hadn't gotten a lot of laps on the test day and we wanted to give Jay a mock qualifying run to get him ready for later that afternoon. Both Jay and Joe thought the car was great.

We had another Grand Am Cup session in the BMW prior to the next Rolex series practice. We softened up the rear spring and came way out of the rear bar, along with some shock changes. It seemed that we went just a little too far because the car had a slight amount of understeer in the middle of the slower corners, but it was still a much better car to drive. I turned a 1:40.4 in the session, which put us in fifth in the session.

Next was qualifying for the Porsche. Grand Am requires that the starting driver qualify, so I was a spectator during the qualifying session. Jay Policastro did a magnificent job putting in a lap of 1:27.2, which was good enough to split the two PTG BMWs and get us second position on the grid. Bill Auberlen got the pole and Boris Said was third in the other BMW.

The final Rolex practice session was on Saturday morning. I felt like we had about as much mechanical grip as we could get, so we focused on aerodynamics, which meant playing with the wing angle. I was out on really old tires and was still able to turn a 1:27.7. We tried stiffening the rear sway bar to compensate for the additional down force on the rear of the car, but this seemed to make the car oversteer excessively as the tires heated up so we took it back out. I felt like we had a good car for the race.

Unfortunately, after the session we found that we had a problem with the engine and it would need to be changed. This meant a lot of work for the Orbit crew prior to the race, and also that we would have to forfeit Jay's well earned starting spot and begin the race at the back of the field.

We had one last session in the BMW prior to qualifying. During the session we had a fuel pressure problem that caused a pretty significant loss of power. The data showed that we were about five mile per hour down on all the straights. On a more positive note, we had made another spring change and I thought the handling of the car was excellent.

Immediately after the session the Turner Motorsports crew got started on addressing the fuel pressure problem and they did a great job to get it resolved in time for qualifying. I shared the car with my former World Challenge teammate Tim Pappas. Tim did a great job qualifying us seventh in a crowded field of twenty-seven Sport Touring class cars. Our sister car grabbed the pole with Will Turner behind the wheel.

THE RACES

The Rolex series race started at 5:30pm on Saturday afternoon. Jay started from pit lane due to our engine change. He moved rapidly through the SGS field, setting some quick times along the way, and soon began dispatching GT cars. Within about thirty minutes he was up to sixth position in GT and closing quickly on the next few positions. At that point the first of several full course cautions arrived. Unfortunately, the overall leader passed Jay only seconds before the yellow and we went a lap down to the five GT cars still ahead of us.

Unbelievably, the process repeated itself again about thirty minutes later. Just as the first two cars in the Daytona Prototype class passed Jay the second full course caution was upon us. We had lost another lap! It was very depressing to watch helplessly in the pits while Jay drove his best stint of the season only to have us lose ground because we had to start from the back. Fortunately, all of the cars in front of us had either just pitted or came in at the wrong time, so by the time it all shook out we were one lap down to the #21 BMW and the #77 Porsche, and back on the same lap with the #22 BMW, the #66 Porsche and the #84 Porsche.

We stopped under the yellow and Joe took over the controls. Joe survived several more full course cautions until one came with about an hour and ten minutes to go and we decided to pit for fuel, tires and a driver change. We had to hurry in the pits so we were only able to do left side tires during the stop. I came back in for the other two tires on the next lap of the caution period. The Orbit crew stuffed in the last little bit of fuel and by the time I headed back out on track it had already gone green so I was a third of a lap behind the field, but I had new tires and a full tank with about an hour and three minutes to go. This was a little longer than our fuel window, but we figured if we ran the fuel conservation map and I short shifted we could make it to the end if it stayed green. All the other GT cars would have to pit in that scenario.

Even on the slower map and using lower rpms I could still easily lap in the low to mid 1:27's. We were catching the other GT cars that were on our lap at a significant rate. I figured that if it stayed green they would all have to pit, and if there was a yellow I could switch the map back, use all the rpms and pick up the pace. I tried hard to save the tires for that eventuality.

After about eight or ten laps under green we had made good progress and Rodger reported that we would be up the backs of our competitors in a few laps. I was carving through the SGS field in the twisty section of the track known as madness with the Howard Boss Prototype in tow. I passed an SGS Porsche going up the hill under the bridge and then headed down into the short braking zone that precedes thunder valley. I tapped the brakes, downshifted and got back on the throttle up the hill when I was slammed behind the right rear tire by the prototype. The impact spun me around as I was cresting the hill and I stopped backward in the middle of the track where he bounced off me again. I was facing the oncoming traffic, watching helplessly as they shot by on either side. As soon as there was a gap in the traffic I gunned it and shot into the grass on the inside of the track out of harm's way.

I started to try to limp back to the pits, but it was immediately clear that we had a broken axle among many other problems. I managed to maneuver it behind the wall where it remained for the rest of the race. There were several yellows after that so I would have had the opportunity to fight it out for third position with the cars that were still on our lap. Unfortunately, it didn't work out that way.

I was glad that I had another race the next day since it gave me another shot a good result. Tim started the car and ran a strong first stint moving us eventually up into the top five. There was a yellow early when a Mustang in the GS class went on its roof of the opening lap, so the first twenty minutes of the race were run under the caution flags. Tim started his forward progress after the restart and we got another yellow flag at around the one hour mark. We were going to bring Tim in for the pit stop and driver change during the yellow. I was doing our race strategy and I wanted to bring him in with several laps remaining in the caution, but I had to talk with him on the radio and didn't have time to alert the crew and get my helmet on. I had to leave him out for one extra lap while we all got ready. The consequence of this was that I couldn't catch the back of the pack prior to the restart so I started about a half lap behind the field.

The first hour or so was pretty uneventful while I tried hard to play catch up. With about thirty minutes remaining in the race I had worked my way up to fourth position when I suddenly was overwhelmed by the smell of fuel. At first I thought maybe a fuel line had come loose. I checked all the gauges, but found nothing. The fuel remaining indicator showed less fuel than I expected us to have, so I was concerned that we were losing fuel at a rapid rate and that either we would run out, or I would pass out from the fumes. I was discussing the situation with the crew for several laps when someone crashed and out came a full course yellow.

The pace car picked me up instead of the overall leader and then proceeded to drive around for several laps. When I finally got waived by they didn't leave enough time for me to get around to the pits, get our stop done and catch back up. In the pits the Turner crew found that we had a venting problem with the fuel. They added some fuel and also fixed my brake lights.

My brake lights hadn't been working for most of the race and we were afraid I would get black flagged. I was flipping the light switch on and off as I entered turn one in hopes of fooling the officials into thinking I had brake lights, but I found out after the race that it wasn't working.

When I got back on track I was still in fourth, but once again half a lap back. All I could really do was hope for a caution. We got one late, but the restart came with two laps to go and I had about eight cars between myself and the third place car. To make matters worse, the two cars in front of me were in no hurry to start racing once the green came out. I passed them both the instant it went green, but by the time I came on to the front straight the rest of the field was in turn one. I pushed hard, but there was no point. We had to settle for fourth, which was a good result considering everything that went on, and it also helped Tim because he is well up in the points race and fourth gave him solid points. All in all, it wasn't the most successful weekend, but in a couple days I go to Watkins Glen to drive the Porsche in the next round of the Rolex series so there won't be much time ponder the result.