The View from a Corner
by Bob Gabri

With Australia behind me, it is time for some local tracks. The
Trans-Am at Mosport is canceled, so my first event is Trans-Am/IMSA at
Lime Rock Park, Memorial Day Weekend.

IMSA no longer goes by that name. They now call themselves
Professional xxxxxxxxx Racing, Inc. They announced this name change at
Sebring, Florida in March and they no longer have any references to
IMSA. (Ed: SCCA will not allow SportsCar to be used by other
organizations) Last September IMSA was purchased by International
Motorsports Speedway Group (IMSG). This group of investors is led by
Robert Mueller and Andrew Evans, who is acting chairman. Along with a
complete staff change, they also changed their name to xxxxxxxxx and
it is featured on all their logos. The main classes of cars racing
here are the World Sports Cars, the Exxon Supreme GT series, SCCA
Trans-Am and SCCA World Challenge. Support races are the Neon
Challenge and Barber Dodges.

Friday I worked station 10, which is the Black Flag station and
located just before the crossover bridge. Everything seemed to run
pretty normal that day until the World Challenge cars came out. The
cars would drift to the edge of the track coming out of nine, and some
of them would just touch the stones at the edge. A Honda came around
the turn and onto the stones then into the tires. The tires bounced
him back onto the track and he came rolling towards our station. The
woman on the phones started climbing up the hill and hurt her neck
when she reached the end of her phone cord.

The car stopped on its side right in front of the station. I went to
it to see the about the condition of the driver. He said that he was
OK, but his wrist hurt and he thought that it might be broken. He
seemed familiar so I took a good look at the car and on the door was
the name Peter Schwartzott. By this time all kinds of rescue vehicles
were starting to arrive. The medical personal put a temporary splint
on his wrist and got him out of the car and off to the hospital. The
car was hauled away by the wrecker and it appeared too far gone to be
repaired.

I got to thinking, Peter rolled his car in front of me several years
ago at Watkins Glen, and it was station 10.

With no racing in Connecticut on Sunday, all the big races are done on
Monday. This time I am located at the chicane. During the Trans-Am
race there was never a problem at our station, the only flag in use
was the Blue. During the World Sports Cars, I worked on drivers right,
right at the chicane. There were some problems with one of the WSC
cars going real slow and he became a moving chicane to the other
drivers. He had been slow all weekend and this was what they had to
put up with.

Near the end of the race, Jim Downing's Kudzu spun in the chicane and
ended up high-centered, half on, half off the track. Not sure if I
should go trackside or not, I went over the tires and gave him a push
backward onto the track. He was free. He gunned it, spun it around,
and got high-centered again. I repeated the same procedure as before
and he left this time with a little more grace. Three laps later,
Scott Schubot's car did the same thing, but I only had to push him out
once.

The last race of the day was the Exxon Supreme GT. Besides the usual
Porsches, Mustangs and BMWs, there was a new car out this year. It was
called a Panoz GTR-1. It is a 50's style fastback with a long hood and
the drivers compartment just in front of the rear wheels. Sort of like
a TVR or a Griffith, but much longer. It was co-driven by Paul Newman
and Doc Bundy.

Paul started the race in the car, but got very little race time
because of numerous full course yellows. The first 45 minutes of the 1
hour and 45 minute race was almost all yellow flag. Paul saw 40
minutes of this before handing the car over to Doc. Near the end of
the race, the Panoz and a Porsche came together during a pass at turn
3. It damaged the LF fender of the Panoz but he was able to continue,
finishing in 2nd place in his class.

With just two days to unpack, clean, shop and repack, there is little
time to rest, let alone get anything done around the house.

The following weekend Professional xxxxxxxxx Racing (PSCR) is at
Watkins Glen and so am I. This is a six hour endurance race for the
WSC and Exxon Supreme cars. Last year was their first six hour at the
Glen. Also included is a three hour race for the stock sports cars
which you will remember as the old Firehawk series. This field is
quite large, with over seventy entries.

Friday I am at the toe of the boot, station 13. I had been told that
the boot had been resurfaced, and now seeing it, I can say that they
did a nice job. The cars going around this turn had terrific grip. You
could hear the street tires growling, but they didn't slide, unless
someone did something foolish in the middle of the turn. During the
weekend several track records were broken and I think this is
why. With such good grip in the turn, we almost went the whole day
without a spin. A WSC car did spin and go into the guardrail after
trying to pass a slower moving WSC car that was also slow at Lime
Rock. I spoke to the crew that evening in the garages. They said it
was only sheet metal damage and a new nose was put on it, a mere
$6,000. The stock cars (Firehawks) are fun to watch. There are always
a lot of them, there's lots of passing and it's like watching
commuters racing home on a Friday after work.

One other thing happened at station 13. I heard a photographer yell
something at me. I looked and thought I saw a small dog running toward
the guardrail. I ran over to the spot and saw that is was a very small
fawn, about a foot and a half tall. I chased it back into the woods
before the cars came around again.

Saturday and Sunday I was Blue Flag at station 16. Saturday was the
day of the 3 Hr. endurance race for the stock cars. Usually a bunch
will go off at station 1 on the first lap, but today they made it all
the way to station 4 before they started having their fun. Over the
scanner I heard one of the drivers make a comment about being a bunch
of Ping Pong Balls. Another driver said "They really beat up that one
guy." It doesn't take long to make a full course yellow and stop the
racing. When the cars made it around to my station, I could see a few
of them with battle wounds, trying to limp back to the pits. During
the course of the race I think we had about ten separate incidents
that brought out the yellow. This was far better than last year when
the yellow flag was out for the first two hours of the three hour
race.

It rained Saturday night and Sunday it was still sprinkling a little,
along with overcast clouds, and FOG. All warm up sessions were
canceled. Still fog. The Black Magic Pro Series that was supposed to
start at 9:30 AM was moved back and started a little after 11:00
AM. This moved the 11:00 AM start of the six hour race to just after
noon.

With overcast skies and a light sprinkle, the Six Hours of the Glen
got started. With forty nine cars on the track, it didn't take too
long for a dry path to form on the racing line. Within a couple of
laps, the Dyson WSC car went straight off at station 15 and then made
it back on, but not without digging up a lot of mud and leaving it on
his nose. There were a lot of accidents out on the course which
brought out the yellows. They would get things cleaned up and go
Green, but it usually didn't last too long before another full course
yellow. I think these guys were doing worse that the stocks yesterday.

The Panoz GTR-1 was also here for this event, but Mr. Newman was
replaced by Andy Wallace. The car qualified in twelfth position, first
in GT1 class. It held that position for a while, then dropped to
second, then third. I don't know why. I think he got back to first in
class by the end of the race. The WSC car who was so slow finally hit
the rail by me during a full course yellow. The car was damaged a
little and went in with the hook. It didn't seem that bad, but he
never returned. With less than a half an hour from the end of the
race, I saw the Momo Ferrari go straight into the tire wall at station
15. Over the scanner I hear that this happened just after a metal to
metal with car #1. The car does not move from the tire wall. Course
workers stationed at 15 run to the car and push it out of the
tires. Because of the wet grass and mud, it has no traction. The
workers push it behind the tire wall, but over the radio I hear that
he wants to continue. With the engine screaming to 10,000 to 12,000
RPMs, the driver tries to take off. All of a sudden there is no sound
at all. Over the scanner I hear a worker say "that engine is toast". A
couple of minutes later I hear that the engine "ate a piston". The car
eventually is hauled back to his garage on a flatbed. About 3 or 4
laps after the metal to metal with the Momo car, the #1 car of Wayne
Taylor came around with tons of smoke coming out of the car. It only
came out during acceleration and there was lots of it. After he went
by, we never saw him again. The WSC car driven by James Weaver, Butch
Leitzinger and EFR did a good job of staying out of trouble for the
whole race and went on to win.

With close to 50 cars starting the race, I think we did quite well
with over half of them finishing, considering the amount of carnage
that went on during the race.