Never mind October, here we are at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca for what is the next to last race of the 2013 Grand Am season and actually the next to last race for the series. In October, which for awhile was the traditional Laguna Fall race date, the weather could be considered a crap-shoot. Right now, it’s like crap, shoot. Summer finally arrived here in Central California and driving through the area yesterday I was greeted with a blistering 90+ degrees. Yech.
One problem here for the series and the track is that the WTCC series makes its now annual appearance at Sonoma/Sears Point, which is only about 3 hours away to the north. That is sure to cut into both the spectator attendance and also the vendor turnout which has not been awfully strong here in the past.
First off, as was mentioned in the preview, the points chase in both the DP and GT ranks are incredibly tight – almost stupidly tight. Essentially 5 points separate Velocity (Wayne Taylor Racing) from Action Express, Starworks, Gainsco and Ganassi. In GT it is Scuderia Corsa over Magnus and Stevenson Racing by a scant 3 points, with AIM another 10 points back. The stakes are pretty high here at Laguna.
This is essentially a two day event and the schedule is jammed very tightly. The morning started off with a support class, followed a 45 minute Continental Tire Series and then the Rolex Series. First off, the GT/GX class had the track all to themselves for 25 minutes, then the classes combined for 40 minutes, after which it was DP by themselves for 25 minutes.
Somewhat surprisingly for Laguna, the sessions were pretty much incident free – the 71 Park Place Porsche had an excursion into the kitty litter to possibly relieve itself, but the car was eventually rescued and all was well.
Finally making an appearance in the GT class is TRG and their Rolex GT spec Aston Martin. None other than team owner Kevin Buckler debuted the car at their home circuit a few weeks ago in the World Challenge race at Sonoma/Sears Point. After starting from the pit lane, Buckler worked his way up to a 7th place finish in a car not really yet suited to the series.
“We were running to Grand Am spec, thus without the ABS, so we did lose time in some of the track, but I’m pretty happy with the result.” This was the first time back on track for Buckler in quite some time, and will likely be his last as he oversees his team and their full time switch to Aston Martin race cars. “This GT car will finish off the season at Lime Rock and then return for the full season in the GTD class next season. Kevin indicated that his team still hopes to make an entry in the GTLM class next year in the USCR.
In the morning session, the team struggled with set up, not surprisingly for the first time out here and eventually settled for a 1:30.115, just over 2 seconds off the pace. Fastest GT class entrant was the Turner BMW of Dalla Lana/Auberlen. Of those really in the points chase, it was a very nice grouping of Balzan/Scuderia Corsa 6th, Assentato/AIM 7th, Potter/Magnus 8th and Liddell/Stevenson 9th.
The new GX spec Lotus Evora finished the session a distant last overall, about 2.5 seconds off the class pace.
In DP, it was Ozz Negri setting the pace for Michael Shank Racing, setting his session leading time in the in the later part of the session. Earlier it had been the championship contending Ganassi pair of Pruett/Rojas leading the session, but the fell back to 3rd, eclipsed by Gainsco.
It was the 01 Ganassi BMW that entered the pits with a smoking motor and did not return. According to engine builder Steve Dinan, it was a detonation issue that caused the engine to blow. Not a great confidence builder for the team as they try to capture their 6th DP championship.
Meanwhile, news about the upcoming regs and schedule is pretty much non-existent…
Gary Horrocks
