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Laguna Seca

09/09/2001

Friday

Full Details

© Tom Kjos

Monterey, California, USA—The sanctioning body is quick to point out that testing is not really an “official” event, and times are not “official.” Still, to test properly, you have to go fast. Every car handles just fine ten miles per hour short of the limit. What is different about testing is that it is the first event of the weekend, so there is a lot of time to get better.

Of course Stefan Johansson and Patrick LeMarié hope that there is enough improvement left in the Gulf Audi R8 to leave them in the same place at the end of the day Saturday as today—at the top of the timing charts. Although the 1:15.967 they clocked is nearly a second off the track record, it is also nearly a second ahead of their rich “city cousins,” the two R8s of works team Audi Sport North America.

Very close behind the Gulf car was the #50 Panoz of Magnussen and Brabham, the winner of two of the last three ALMS races, and particularly quick in the race here last year. Then there is over a half second gap before the works Audis, led by the #2 of Frank Biela and Emanuele Pirro. The second Panoz followed the two silver Audis, and then came the Champion R8 and the Cadillacs (in their usual positions), but just a bit closer to the first group than has been the case. Not closer to the pace at all is the Jon Field / Rick Sutherland Lola B2K / 10B Judd, languishing ninth, a full three seconds back of the slower of the Cadillacs. Neither the larger restrictor nor the new chassis seem to have contributed to more competitive times; at least so far.

In fact, the Field Lola is only three-tens quicker than the first of the LMP675s, the Didier de Radigues / Milka Duno Reynard 01Q Judd V8. Unfortunately for racing in that class, the closest challenger, Steven Knight and Mel Hawkin’s Lola B2K / 40 Nissan, is still a full two seconds slower.

In GTS, this not being a race day, Franz Konrad and Terry Borcheller had their Saleen S7R well out ahead of the two Corvettes. The #3 Corvette of Ron Fellows and Johnny O’Connell was getting some work in the paddock, however. This car got the new six-speed transaxle at Sears Point and the sister car got the same upgrade before Mosport. Now it is time for a little optimizing. Before this weekend, first gear has reportedly been little more than a “get rolling” selection. Now the team is re-gearing the six-speed to improve performance. Saturday will bring us the first result of the changes.

The big story here is the “missing” American Viperacing Dodge Viper GTS-Rs. Neither participated in testing today. Both were pieces in the paddock. The interesting part is the pieces themselves (or “bits” as the Editor would say). Those bits were arriving from the Netherlands and France in a steady stream of Fed Ex and UPS trucks all morning. I couldn’t write fast enough to catalogue them all, nor could my mechanically challenged head really follow all of it, but team principal and driver Tom Weickardt tried to take us through it all. “Based on what we learned (about the cars racing them) and also on investigation in Europe, we found that our cars were not stiff enough in the front,” Tom said. AVR was installing new sway bars (one of them carbon fiber), new Penske shocks, new suspension uprights, and new cowl cross bracing in the two cars. The cars, according to a parade of the best drivers, including ORECA star David Donohue, were very difficult to drive, at best, and nearly impossible to drive fast. This information, delivered with great sincerity, will lead this scribe to be much kinder to Tom and his co-drivers in the #44 car. But the changes have not stopped there. At the back, the cars get a new viscous mechanical differential, a more effective, and thirty pound lighter, unit. Under the hood, the #45 car gets a new intake plenum that will extend the power band downward by 500 rpm to 3,500 and increase torque by 30 foot pounds. All this after major bodywork restorations as a result of crashes by Tom, Shane Lewis, and David Donohue. The biggest problem may remain, however. According to Weickardt, the tires still will leave the car as much as 1.5 seconds a lap slower than the same Viper on the Michelins run by the ORECA team. And the team has been unable to double stint their tires. One double in a race by a competing team leaves AVR approximately 20 seconds adrift in lost time in the pit. Regardless of the extent of the changes, Tom is cautious about the results. “We don’t know if the cars will be any faster, but it will be easier to set it up, and we should be more consistent lap-to-lap in the race.”

It has been a long haul from Texas for this team. I asked Weickardt whether he anticipated all this then. “Once I got into this I just can’t get out. I feel like the dog that can’t get out of the swimming pool.” Here is a man that couldn’t deny that he has been forced to take a little fun to the level of an obsession.

As we reported late last night, the nearly nine hour negotiation between BMW Motorsport and the Automobile Club of the West (ACO) ended in a bit of a stand-off. The ACO will get the restrictor reduction to 29 mm that they wanted for the M3 GTR—for this race, anyway. BMW came away with an agreement to review that decision before the Petit Le Mans early next months.

Today, the GTRs' performance on a reportedly slippery track was enough to make the GT class the only one that broke the existing track record, and three of them did, led by Bill Auberlen and Boris Said’s #10 PTG car. PTG has been putting in the fastest laps race-to-race, while the Schnitzer-run BMW Motorsport team has been taking away most of the points. The Petersen Motorsports #30 GT3-RS was close behind these three, less than five hundredths off the record themselves. The first of the Alex Job Racing Porsches followed closely. As has been the case, seven GTs (four BMWs and three Porsches) were close on each others' heels—this time within one second. That has been with a 31.4 mm restrictor on the M3s. Will the 2.4 mm reduction have the effect of reversing the order; of restoring Porsche to what they believe is their rightful place at the front? If so, what does that do for customer interest in the new GTRs?

There will be much to watch in Saturday’s practice and qualifying.