Tag: Grand-Am

Mid-October and racing is going into the final laps. Indy was done a while ago. Grand-Am is done. American Le Mans closes this weekend. NASCAR has a hadfull of races left. Formula 1 also has a few left, including the return to America. NHRA still has a couple left…

Ryan Hunter-Reay won the IndyCar title. Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas won the Daytona Prototypes with Chip Ganassi Racing in Grand-Am. The GT title was driven away with Jeff Segal and Emil Assentato for AIM Autosport. The classes of American Le Mans have been mathematically clinched heading into an all out race to win for the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta.

NASCAR is at Kansas this weekend, then on to Martinsville, Texas, Phoenix and Homestead. Brad Keselowski is currently edging the points. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. is still nursing a concussion and should be back by Martinsville. (more…)

Some of the best racing at The Brickyard was Friday evening, and the grandstands were all but empty. There were people about the place, but for the most part the seating looked more like aluminum storage.

This first visit to Indianapolis Motor Speedway by the ROLEX Grand-Am series showcased everything that defines motor racing and few, a very few, even bothered to give the race an eye.

When the green flag drops on Sunday’s Curtiss Shaver 400, the NASCAR Sprint Cup race, the grandstands will be crowded, filled and full of “race” fans. Or should we say “NASCAR” fans… They aren’t “race” fans. The proof was the empty aluminum on Friday. With that omission, they deprived themselves of a great event. (more…)

We missed some racing.

But then… We missed a lot of things…  Air conditioning, refrigeration, lights, computer, internet, television…

We were luckier than many as we had hot and cold running water. Natural gas for the water heater…  Some had no running water at all.

Yes. The storm along the eastern United States got us. The last thing on the television was qualifying from Sparta, KY. High winds shut it down. Bits of pop-up tents were flying around the infield and garage area sweeping up setup notes, driver caps and SPEED personality scripts. At the time that seemed a bit unusual. Unusual to the point that we checked online for the weather in the area of Sparta. It was a storm with an arc of color indicating heavy rain moving across Ohio and northern Kentucky.

“Hmmm – That is interesting” and “Wow” and “Sucks for them” were pretty much the thoughts at the time. (more…)

The Grand-Am ROLEX racing has come down to a classic American rivalry. It appears as if the “Chevy vs. Ford” argument is being played out on the course from race to race with Chevy and those new Corvette styled Daytona Prototypes placing some good punches.

Ford and Starworks Motorsport are leading the Driver and Team points marks while Chevy has the manufacturer’s lead. Ford swept the top 3 at the ROLEX 24 with Starworks sandwiched between the Fords of Michael Shank Racing. However, from that point on to just this last race in Detroit, the Chevy teams have taken the top spot on the podium.

Will the “Corvettes” dominate for the rest of the season? Will the Ford folks fight back? Can Chip Ganassi hold on while clinging to BMW power?

It does have to be difficult for the BMW / Ganassi Racing teams being the lone guns up against a field overrun by Detroit muscle. They get little sympathy from the Ford teams as the Corvette DP teams are running the show with four consecutive wins following the Daytona opener. (more…)

Auto Racing, in general, is having a bit of an identity crisis. It is not so much that the fans, or even the general public, do not recognize it. It is more a general feeling that there is no real connection to racing anymore.

Practically everybody can look at the #14 Office Depot Chevy driven by Tony Stewart in NASCAR and recognize it as a “NASCAR” race car. However, present the general public with the #10 Target / Ganassi Racing Honda of Dario Franchitti and the #4 Vodafone McLaren of Lewis Hamilton you will find that few outside of the paddock recognize the difference from IndyCar to Formula 1. Both of those cars, to the “non-racing” public, are likely identified as one or the other.

The “prototypes” of Grand-Am and American Le Mans are beautiful bits of shell and engineering but to the casual observer they are simply “race cars”.

Generally, if you throw a number and a logo on any given car it becomes recognizable as a “race car”. (more…)

The NASCAR season is well underway. A look back from the Easter break after Martinsville shows the points are beginning to stack up with familiar names but the order is shaken a bit from what we may have come to expect. Greg Biffle is on top. He has always been in the group as a contender but riding this momentum of early season points is likely to fade unless there is a win coming. Dale Earnhardt, Jr. is right there in the second slot, also without a win, and just six points off. Defending Champion Tony Stewart has two wins out of six races (plus a bonus of one of the Gatorade Duals) and is in the third position chasing 12 points. Matt Kenseth, Kevin Harvick and Martin Truex, Jr. share the same 12 point deficit.

NASCAR is shaping up to generate some momentum for the fans as well. The drama of Jimmie Johnson penalties while still able to fight back to the tenth points slot is amazing. Jeff Gordon is 90 points back which is uncommon. Kurt Busch is fighting bad press from last season and bad luck for this one.

Those are just a few of the possible drama lines for fans to chat over. There are many more on tap and still to come. (more…)

Virginia International Raceway had some tangles in 2011. The AMA “Suzuki White Lightning” event was pulled from the August date basically from a lack of communication, contract verbiage and an issue with promotions. Fingers pointed both ways. The end picture is that a big weekend at VIR was out.

Follow that with the announcement from the Grand-Am ROLEX Series that VIR would not be on the schedule for 2012.  New Jersey gets an earlier date and Belle Isle Park in Detroit is added to the mix. The Grand-Am race has been a showcase nationwide coverage event for VIR for several years.
Two big events that went a long way to re-establish Virginia International Raceway as a destination for fans and racing were out of the picture as 2011 came to a close.

This would seem to put a kink in the potential for 2012. Hit the brakes and stop the presses, so to speak. However, the folks at VIR have some surprises in store that may have blown by while you were watching the last turn… (more…)