Ever go on a long trip with a couple of friends, say a 12-hour trip south? Maybe there were three of you and you all took turns driving for two or three hours on the highway. Imagine it was a holiday weekend and the highway was crowded with traffic. You stop a few times for gas and check your oil. After 12 hours of driving in heavy traffic taking turns you and your friends are downright exhausted and ready to turn in once at your destination.
Now imagine that instead of cruising at 65 mph, you were actually cruising at 140 plus miles per hour. And instead of sitting in a nice air-conditioned car, you are sitting in a car with no air conditioning, you're suited up in a full fireproof suit and it's 120 plus degrees in the car. Then imagine that you are surrounded by cars that make your average case of road rage look mild. Forget about a nice stereo, you being bombarded by 8000 rpm's and a suspension so stiff you're looking for your teeth somewhere on the floorboards. When you stop for fuel you have 5 team members to rushing to change brakes, tires, and other items that may need attention. You don't get this kind of customer service at your local Jiffy Lube station.
That's what Summit Point Raceway felt like on June 4th, 2005. Nearly 60 cars took the checkered flag at the start of the Annual Kumho Tires 12 Hours at the Point. Cars ranging from a 100 horsepower Honda CRX ITC car costing maybe $5000 to build to a professional BMW factory PTG E46 M3 that most likely cost $150,000 at a minimum to build. Throw in some Porsche's, Benz's, Mazda Miatas, and a gaggle of Hondas, Nissans, and the odd Dodge Neon and you've got rush hour traffic in 90-degree heat at 130 mph. Only rush hour is 12 straight hours and no one is slowing down for anything.
 I drove as part of the iCarp/ Hankook Tires team in the number 18 Acura Integra running in ITA class. This story is a short run down of what transpired from one driver's point of view. My small contribution entailed a 2 hour 47 minute stint in the car during the race. Keep in mind that for such an effort the team spent six months and countless hours preparing for this task. The car was completely rebuilt and everything was new.
My teammates and crew did much of the work before I ever stepped foot inside the gates of Summit Point Raceway on the evening if June 3rd around 7 pm. When I arrived they were installing new front shocks and springs and installing other parts. I was told I would get one practice session in the dark at 9 pm and that my teammate would be qualifying the car at 8 pm. My teammates were Ian Carpenter of iCarp/Team Hankook, whom I battled last year in NASA Pro Racing's Honda Challenge for the coveted H4 title. My other co-driver was Ian's teammate and car owner Andrew Zimmermann, runner up in H4 last year in only his first year of racing. Rounding out the team was a veteran vintage racer, Matt Foley, who has raced every manner of open wheel formula car at the vintage level.
We were aided by a crew of friends and fellow racers all willing to lend a helping hand in whatever needed to be done.
Eventually qualifying gets under way and already the "rookie" curse of Summit Point takes it's grasp of our team. Ian, our strongest driver, encounters brake problems when a front caliper bolt comes loose. He gets a total of one hot lap before needing to come in. Qualifying is over. By some miracle Ian sets a fast enough lap time to get second, behind the CRX of Tom Blaney.
I suit up for practice in total darkness. Not very encouraging since I haven't been in a racecar since November of 2004. I struggle for most of the session. We decided against auxiliary lights and I can't see the edge of the track. There are literally no reference points for braking points, turn in points, or other markers. I early apex turn 3 at least four or five times. In turn 10 I continually get a front wheel off the edge of the track under braking. Nearly forty-five minutes later the session is over and I struggle to comprehend how someone who has done most likely 5000 laps at Summit Point could be so lost. Never again will I joke to people that I can drive Summit Point blindfolded.
 Saturday morning we decide to make some suspension changes. The car has been very twitchy all week in practice and qualifying. Ian and Matt decide to adjust the rear left corner. After one lap of practice Ian pits immediately and Matt and the team do a quick
adjustment in the pits to solve the problem. Ian goes out and reports back that the car is substantially improved. There is nothing left to do on the car at this stage and we spend the last hour or so before needing to grid talking pit strategy and discussing the pace we will run during the race.
The driving order will consist of Zimmermann doing the first stint, followed by myself. The strategy is to see how long I can stay out on the second stint and then get Matt Foley in the car before the halfway point where we will need to change brakes and tires. Andrew will get back in for his second stint around 6 to 6:30 followed by the final stint driven by Ian in the evening darkness.
The race starts in a fury of noise with race engines buzzing. Nearly 60 cars head for turn one like it's a forty-five minute sprint race. The first 10 laps or so the leading Porsche GT3 Cup car and the PTG M3 race for position inches apart. If you didn't know this was an endurance race you'd swear they were down to the last couple of laps and a championship was at stake.
We started 2nd in class somewhere in the first third of the field but Andrew radioed in that the left front tire was down on air. We had forgotten to add three pounds of pressure and Andrew noticed it immediately. The decision was to leave him out and not pit. Andrew reported that the car was handling badly and the SBMS Racing #26 ITA CRX driven by Tom Blaney was opening up a gap at a fierce pace.
Then disaster struck for the SBMS team as the car came into the pits a few laps latter with what appeared to be steam from the engine compartment. It had overheated. The team worked in the pits for 10 minutes before taking the car back to the paddock to work on it. The problem turned out to be terminal. Meanwhile we were now doing battle with the #06 Integra of Zelones/Arzola/Randell who were running about the same lap times but getting through traffic a bit quicker. Andrew held them off for most of his stint with some fantastic driving.
At around 1:45 or so Andrew pitted and we changed tires as I got into the car. From the start I knew it would be a sprint race. I had no idea how long I would last in the car having never raced for more than one hour. From the onset, the car had wicked oversteer with a full 22 gallons of fuel. In turns nine and ten the car was so loose I thought something was broken in the rear suspension. Everywhere else on the track the car stuck like glue thanks to the awesome TEIN coil overs. I don't think I had ever carried as much speed through turn three that first part of the stint than before. Oddly enough the handling started to reverse itself as the fuel load lightened and by the end of the stint the car was hooked up in turns nine and ten. Conversely turn three was now a handful as was the carousel. The front tires would overheat and the car would understeer in turns six and seven.
At one point I caught the #06 Integra and tried to get past him. I was at least a full second quicker but he drove a damn near perfect defensive line for four or five laps. I radioed in to the crew that I wasn't going to chance a pass against someone who was fighting me for position. I had visions of being pushed wide or having contact and having to bring a damaged car back to the pits. In retrospect the Alpha Systems #06 car raced us hard and clean the entire race. I radioed in that I was going to stay on his trail and try to force him into a mistake as his tires were loosing grip in most turns. On the sixth lap or so he ran wide at the exit of turn one and I got by him on the inside. He pitted about three laps later and our crew chief Don Barrack told me to step it up a notch and get some hot laps in while they #06 crew did brakes and tires. I did five laps while the #06 car was in the pits set fastest lap for the race during their pit stop.
The brakes were getting boiled as well. At one point I had the pedal to the floor entering turn one and had massive fade. I somehow managed to keep the car straight and then throw it into a drift at the last minute as the brakes briefly took hold. In addition the traffic was horrendous. The Spec Miatas were all doing battle with each other and were grouped together in clusters of two and three cars. I would catch the slower Miatas pretty quickly but didn't want to mess up their races but couldn't afford to hang back and let the #06 Integra make up ground.
In hindsight I realized later I took some risky chances but luck was with me that day. Until I was black-flagged for passing two Miatas under a local yellow in turn five. I never saw the flag but came in for a stop and go. Right after the penalty I lost all radio contact with the crew but stayed out until they signaled me in for a pit stop at slightly after 4 pm. I pulled the car into the pits thinking I could have easily done another thirty minutes in the car. Your adrenaline level is sky high when you are out on the track racing. I had no idea if I had been in the car for an hour, two hours or three hours. But once I got out of the car the adrenaline level of course dropped and I felt like I was going to fall flat on my face.
I helped our third driver, Matt Foley, into the car and tried to relay as much information as possible to him about the brakes being overheated and the front tires getting overheated as well. Then I crossed over the pit wall and slumped into a chair. After removing my helmet I guzzled at least four pints of water. I did just under 100 laps in the car and my stint was two hours and forty-seven minutes.
For the next two and half hours our next driver, Matt Foley, pounded out the laps and tried to come to grips with the car I had left him. The front tires were understeering badly and the brakes were getting closer and closer to being complete toast as we say in racing terms. Matt however, did an awesome job matching my fastest lap times on rubber and brakes that were in far worse condition than what I had experienced.
About halfway through Matt's stint he was able to cool down the brakes and tires when a Spec Miata spun in turn ten and was t-boned by another Spec Maita which never saw him spin across the track until it was too late. Both Miatas were totaled but the drivers were able to walk away from the wreck.
During this time the #06 car had to pit and do a complete front brake job, tires, fuel and their third driver. This is where experience would shine through for them in their fifth 12-hour race. They completed everything in six minutes. Conversely when Matt finally pitted after a two and half hour stint we weren't able to match the same speed on our pit stop. We were somewhat unprepared for Matt and Andrew had to suit up in a hurry. Also we had problems on the left side of the car getting the pads and rotors on. The pit stop lasted nearly 9 minutes and the #06 car passed by us while we were getting Andrew buckled in.
Andrew also came out of the pits at the worst possible time. He came out behind a cluster of Spec Miatas and ITC cars. Within a few laps the #06 was only 29 seconds away from catching Andrew and putting us a lap down. Our crew on the pit wall kept timing the gap as was I doing in the pits. The gap slowly worked its way down to about 15 seconds. Then in one lap they got within 6 seconds when Andrew hit some traffic. For the next twenty laps or so Andrew kept the gap constant and turned some very fast laps. At the 8:45 mark we decided to bring him in to the pits. Unfortunately we had no radio since the 2nd hour so we were trying to get his attention with a pit board. We ended up having to resort to aiming a flash light at out fuel catch pan.
Andrew came in and we had everything going very smoothly until we had a minor fuel spill. The #06 team was right next to our pit and promptly pointed this out to the marshals who hit us with a 45 second penalty.
Ian got into the car at 8:47 pm and from the outset kept a blistering pace going for the next hour running lap times that were only a second or two off the fastest times even though he was driving in complete darkness.
At around 10:30 pm the #06 car had to pit for brakes and this stop took roughly six minutes. At this stage Ian built a three-lap lead but we knew we would have to pit for fuel. The only question was whether we too would have to do a brake change. It was going to be close. From the pits we calculated that Ian's lap times were only about a second slower than at the start of his stint. We were optimistic that all he would need is fuel.
At 11:17 pm Ian came into the pits and we started fueling the car. The brake rotors were glowing red and a quick scan of each rotor with a pyrometer showed they were at 900 degrees and this was after a cool down lap to pit. It was at this stage that we decided to forgo changing the brakes. In hindsight it was the right thing to do but we had no way of knowing if Ian could finish the race. His pads were close to being down to the backing plates and we saw stress fractures in the rotors.
It was clear after the eleven and half hour mark that the #06 team was struggling with more brake problems as their lap times started plummeting into the 1:40's and above. At this stage we wanted to inform Ian to back off but with no communication gear there was no way to let him know. For the last twenty minutes or so Ian was in a zone clicking off fast laps. With a few laps to go his brakes were finally gone as well. On the very last lap Ian informed us afterwards he had literally no brakes at all. But it was enough to win the race by a margin of four laps and earned the team a first place in class and a seventh place overall out of 55 cars.
I don't think it really sunk in until a week or so later what we had accomplished. Winning an endurance race takes preparation, execution and lastly a good bit of luck. We knew the preparation was never in doubt. Matt and Ian prepped this car for at least 100 hours and we had organized and planned everything for six months. Execution and luck were the two variables that we were unsure of. Once the race started it was clear that execution was on our side as the car ran smoothly and our pit stops, save for one long one, went well. That left luck to spare. There were several bad crashes, several cars hitting deer, at least three Spec Miatas, which lost differentials and a whole host of other obstacles during the race.
In the end we pulled it out with a total team effort. In most forms of racing the drivers get all the attention and credit but the people behind the scenes made all this possible. We had a great crew chief, pit crew, team leader, great sponsors and some not too shabby drivers.
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