DB_NC_95C2

I haven't even watched the race, but I went up yesterday for practice and qualifying. One of the Brumos guys told me Grand Am hamstrung the Porsche-engined prototypes after Daytona. The Rolex 24 Porsche DP engine was 9200 rpm and 6 gears, 4.0L. After Donohue won the Rolex, Grand Am ramped the rev limit back to 9000 and said 'no 6th gear'. Well that screws them on VIR's straights, but they're still the best sounding cars there.
Got Donohue and Darren Law to sign the one-page 'we won Daytona' Porsche ad. Hurley wasn't there on Friday, only today and I couldn't make it up today.

For sportscar fans from the late 90s and F1 fans, I took this with me and carried it around the paddock :

http://i41.tinypic.com/2s78bxv.jpg

and got Ricardo Zonta to sign it. It had already been signed by Bernd Schneider and Klaus Ludwig. I saw the car race at Homestead in 98 before I became a big Porsche fan. Met all the drivers, had hot pit passes, the guy I went with was friends with Bernd Maylaender (now F1 safety car driver). Ricardo got a kick out of seeing and signing the print. I said to him it's ironic that at that Homestead race, Mark Webber threw Schneider's car into the kitty litter, handing the race and title to Klaus and Ricardo, and yet Mark's still in F1 and Ricardo is not. He shrugged as if 'no big deal'. Very nice guy, helluva talent.

MarkD

wow, I hadn't heard that they made those changes on the Porsche powered DP cars...
I haven't watched the race yet but making both of those changes at the same time sure seems severe.

Sounds like a fun day. I took my son to the qualifying rounds at Infineon last year and it was a blast. The Brumos folks were really cool to him, got to sit in the 59 car and gave him a hat.
He's 5 and he has no idea how lucky he is

Black993

Thats lame. They won a race so they need to be penalized? WTF!? Who's running this show, the FIA?

MarkD

they did have the others beat by a lot on power @ Daytona. There was a lot of whining during the race... was kinda funny

This kind of give and take always happens... just seems extreme to limit RPM and take away a gear all in one shot

RollingArt

You may have heard of the sanctioning body. They are called NASCAR. What do they know about putting on a good show that anyone would want to watch?

Phil

DB_NC_95C2

GrandAm IMHO is the worst of the governing bodies in the 'equalization' game. Next comes IMSA/ALMS. FIA has it right this year so far but Mosley's ideas about a 'spec engine' will chase all the manufacturers out of the sport. I wish FOTA would leave Max and Bernie and just start their own series. I still haven't watched the GrandAm race, recorded... .later today

DB_NC_95C2

Zonta also signed this, I just finished framing it (11x14)... his BAR-Honda

I gave him a second copy I had of the same photo, I've been told by more than one that drivers often don't have good photos of themselves in their own cars, surprising but true. At Petit last year, I gave Dario Franchitti a photo of him in his British F3 car and you wouldn't believe what a charge he got out of it.

(yes I know, I have a crappy camera, I'm too cheap to buy a better one)

TMc993

Actually, that's a NASCAR-owned series and their freewheeling with the specification is typical NASCAR. That series was put together in response to Dr. Panos putting together his ALMS deal. NASCAR simply didn't want ALMS car on their track for the 24 Hours of Daytona and designed the series to be a "cheap" way to race. In the process, NASCAR diluted the pool of road racing teams over two series and made the Daytona 24 Hour race into a second rate race, depriving road racing fans of the only internationally contested 24 hour endurance event in the U.S. Typical France family bull****.

EDIT: Oops! Didn't see Rolling Art's post...Great minds think alike!