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| Mosport 2005 - PCA CanAm Challenge |
Mosport, Canada, July 29-31, 2005
?Third Time?s No Charm?
2005 PCA CanAm Challenge
by Dr. Frank Celenza, GT5s
Race weekends are so highly anticipated, and yet they bring so many new experiences, each and every time. There are times when you win big (Sebring) and times when you crash your brains out (Road Atlanta). There are so many other factors that you have to overcome, such as mechanical problems, weather issues, health issues, team issues, and who knows how many other little details that can suddenly blow up in your face. And let?s not forget about the reason we do it in the first place; driving issues!
It had been a painfully long and agonizing test of patience to get my car rebuilt from Atlanta and finally on the trailer and headed for Mosport, where the Upper Canada Region PCA was hosting the CanAm Challenge. The DeMan Motorsports team arrived in full force, servicing no less than six cars for this event, including four that needed full sorting and set up. My car was totally rebuilt, from frame straightening right up, and in some ways looked to be even better than it once was, with different alignment and camber set ups. The bodywork was also fitting a little nicer, although some panels were still unpainted, so it wasn?t especially pretty. Ditto for John Stickler?s GT4r 911, it was also a total rebuild after a testing wreck at Summit Point, I don?t think it had any two panels the same color. Rick DeMan was debuting his gorgeous GT3R, a complete and perfect ground-up restoration that could turn out to be the class of the field, and he also brought his new GT3 Cup Car that was going to be sorted out by my coach, Joe Cassana, to become a customer rental car. We were also supporting Dr. Norm Johnson?s GT2r, and Richard Glickel in the DE touring sessions, so the mechanics were going to be busy, and I was concerned that I?d be needing a lot of attention going in. As I said, I had no idea what was to follow.
Mosport is a fantastic and historic circuit. Nestled in the countryside outside of Toronto, it has hosted many top professional races such as CanAm and TransAm for many years, and was also the venue for the Canadian Grand Prix for a long time back in the 70?s. It?s a very difficult and challenging circuit, known for its elevation changes, high speeds, blind crests and off camber corners. I?d never been here, but I was anticipating a Bridgehampton-like experience. By all accounts that I?d studied, it would definitely take big balls to go fast here.
Thursday Test and Tune
There was no question about being here for the open track test day, and we were ready to roll as soon as the track went green. It was open track from 9-5, the perfect way to learn the track and sort the cars. For me, it was like getting acquainted all over again. Out at first for a lap or two, pit for a quick inspection, then a handful of laps and back in for another look over and tire pressures. Back out and trying to get up to speed gradually, taking care to learn the track, sensing anything at all that might be coming loose on the car, and staying out of the way of guys that already know what they?re doing. It was coming together well enough, the handling seemed great, new Hoosiers were gripping fine, and the exhaust note was strong. I headed into the slightly downhill turn one and the car sputtered, then backfired loudly three times and the engine died. I radio?d in that something was wrong, I was off in the grass with a dead car, and a tow truck was dispatched. For the first time in my career, I returned to the pits ?on the rope?.
The crew went to work and quickly diagnosed a timing sensor down low in front of the engine that had gone bad, but it?s removal revealed the reason why. The crank wheel that it reads was cracked and out of round, so it had struck the sensor and ruined it. No problem, Rick told me to expect a few little things like this for now, possible unfound residual crash damage, we?ll get it right. Which, the crew went about doing. We had a spare sensor, the wheel was bent back and welded, but I was off the track until after the lunch break.
After lunch, I went back out and was really working the track, the car felt fine again and I was getting a lot of seat time, now down to 1:42 which I thought was pretty respectable. Two years ago, Rick had run my car at 1:38, good enough for the front row. I ran for a long time with only a few stops to rest, and then the car started breaking up at high revs in high gears. I pitted immediately, and the fuel level was low. Or so we thought. It was time to park it anyway. About then, word came over the radio that Rick was in the wall in the new GT3R. He?d come up on a car that was exiting the pit lane, his closing speed at that point on the track is enormous, and when the other car twitched, he had no time to correct and spun the car in avoidance. He later told us that he couldn?t lock the wheels up to stay in a straight spin because the ABS kicked in and allowed the car to roll into the infield wall where the nose was ripped off.
The day was over, but not for our team. We stayed at the track until 10:30 pm, eventually working under lights, while a display of teamwork and fabrication was put on to get this car back in order. We borrowed a front clip from another team and the boys went about hacking and drilling and cutting bits and pieces to get the clip installed over the new radiators and oil cooler that were also bent. The frame had taken a bit of a hit, so at first things didn?t line up perfectly, but in the end, it was a testament to the team that it was fixed. We, the drivers, figured that hey, none of us have cars with matching body panels, why should the boss? Besides, Rick himself had once told me, as his car was nearing completion, that there is only a very short period of time in a race car?s life when it will look so perfect. Those words turned out to be prophetic.
Friday
The mood on Friday morning seemed to me quite subdued. Uncertainty was in the air. Why were we having such a difficult season? Between all the wrecks, and blown motors, we were starting to wonder just what would happen next? In any case, the event was now under PCA sanction, so 13?s were in effect and the day was now more structured.
I was ready to go out and get right up to speed and was dismayed to head up the backstraight and have the car breaking up again. It didn?t even have enough power to pull fourth gear above 6,000. I tried another lap, but it was definitely off song, so I pitted. Scratch the first session. We checked the ignition sensor gap and it was ok, so we tried a different set of coils. Out for the second session; same thing. Scratch the second session. What followed was a succession of potential solutions, each followed by a test session that was unsuccessful, losing track time with each. The result was emotionally draining. We put new plugs in, raised the fuel pressure, cleaned all the fuel filters, purged the lines, even shut the rev limiter off, and each time I?d get all encouraged that it seemed like a good idea only to have my hopes dashed. Then you start to think that you?re getting behind the 8-ball because everyone else is getting familiar with the track and conditions and I?m not. But, in the back of my mind, I know that as soon as this thing is solved and runs clean again, the event will come back to me.
I decided to run the fun race all the same, because although it wasn?t running right, at least I wasn?t damaging it further. I was quite frankly embarrassed to be gridded on the back row, and then to fall off the back as soon as we hit the back straight, working hard to fight back through the rest of the lap, but it was a losing battle. I felt like the dog at the back of the field falling further behind every lap. By the end, I came apart and radioed in that this had really sucked and I wanted the crew to know it. As always, Joe settled me down by pointing out that there was no need to react because everyone was feeling awful about it already.
Nothing had worked all day, and the guys were on my car nearly non-stop, in between servicing the others. We were confused between the ignition problem that we?d had in the beginning, and the fact that the misfire started when we ran the car low on fuel, so we weren?t sure if it was fuel or ignition. At the end of the day, Rick stepped in and did some diagnostics, measuring header temps to determine that the #1 cylinder was the problem. Then, an intake manifold leak was discovered, so again I was all excited. We stayed at the track late again to fix that one.
Saturday
First thing in the morning we did a compression test to rule out a bent or burned valve, and when that turned up negative, I felt ready to get with it. Out for practice and it misfired right away! Scratch another session, although this time I drove it out. Now we were beyond fixing the car and heading out to test it, we could hear it missing each time we?d fix something and start it up. I told the crew I wanted everything they could think of ruled out, but what I was really hoping for was that they?d finally find a paper towel stuffed in the carbs or something ridiculous. I was still clinging to the notion that if this darn engine would just snarl back to life, I could win with it. Even if that meant waiting until late Sunday, I wanted to do well in the Enduro. At that point, ?the guru? stopped by to say hi to Rick, and so he asked the man himself, Peter Dawes, to lend an ear to my motor. Joe told me to take a picture, as the legend assessed the situation and we all awaited his words of wisdom. After a few moments of contemplation, and poking around at his own sequential check list, he suggested a few really esoteric items that we hadn?t tried, so we went for it. This included a trip to the store for new spark plug leads and once again I was hoping.
It was time for my sprint race and I headed out on the pace lap, from the last row of the grid. Again I radio?d in as soon as I hit the backstraight for the fist time that it wasn?t working, but I was going to run the race anyway. We took the green and I moved ahead of one car and slotted in, trying hard to hold on as we stormed over the blind crest and around the reverse camber turn two. Hard into the back section and out onto the backstraight the car would hardly pull fourth gear and on the shift to fifth would fall flat. However, the car was handling great, so I?d exploit that for the rest of the lap, and draw back into contact with the tail end of the field, only to watch them disappear again over the brow on the straight. It went on like this for a few laps until I lost touch for good. Then the leaders started to appear in my mirrors, and I let them through to go down a lap. Roy Chong was first in his killer 944 Turbo, then a pretty long wait for a gaggle of three 911?s that included my teammate John Stickler. It was great to see him really mixing it up, and he went on to win his class. Later on, my class leader Jim Hamblin put me down a lap, but I stuck to him as long as I could to check some of his lines and I could see that he was really hooked up. Then I got to make my only pass of the whole race when I lapped the last place car right at the checker. It?s not even really worth saying because I was so far off the pace that it?s a hollow reward, but as a result I came home second in my class.
Then the big boys rolled out for the red group sprint race. Rick had qualified the GT3R fifth, so he was right up front when the green waived and these guys went at it tooth and nail. After a few laps of great racing with the cream of the club?s best cars, word came back that there was a huge incident at the turn 5-5A complex. The course went full red and Rick radio?d that he was involved and had hit a few things. Then he was off the radio and not responding. I threw my mountain bike in the back of a pickup truck headed for the far end of the circuit and we drove through the woods to the end of the access road and then I went further up on my bike to arrive at the scene. Everyone was out of their cars and OK, it was a huge three car incident. I got the story right there and then bolted back to report it. Jim Sullivan was running fourth in his GT3, when the motor grenaded going down the chute to turn 5. He arrived there as an absolute fire ball and dumped all of his oil right on the line, so the car right on him spun to the outside gravel trap and barrel-rolled twice. Rick was next and he spun to the infield gravel breaking his tires off the beads and bending his outside wheels when he hit the pavement again, the force very nearly flipping his car as well. The rest of the field had time to react and proceeded through. The track photographer caught it all, and posted the images immediately. They were pretty spectacular, so I bought the whole sequence, as did many others.
So, that was Saturday! Rick took it pretty well and was in good spirits when we took the team out for a great dinner and just kept the weekend rolling. Sunday would be for the two endurance races, and he still had his GT3 Cup Car to run.
Sunday
We were just dying to end the weekend on an upbeat. What they do for the enduros is to group more of the classes together to form two big races, I was hoping to be at the front of the first enduro group, but instead we were put in with the really fast cars. We (the guys in GT5) all protested and asked for a reshuffling, but the national scrutineer wouldn?t budge. I didn?t want to be the big accident that made them think it over again, and I let them know it, as I scratched my entry. All of us did. So, I figured I?m done for the event, but I wasn?t.
I took a ride over to the kart track and watched some great racing on one of the best kart tracks I?d ever seen. Then, I went out to the test track where the SuperMotards were racing and that was pretty cool to see. When I returned to our paddock, Rick approached me immediately and said that I had 20 minutes to decide and get entered in the second enduro to take over from him in the GT3 Cup Car. He was very graciously offering to hand off to me while he went off to relieve his buddy Pat Martin in his Cup Car. What a decision to make! I had never set foot in this car, or anything like it, and I was now going to head out into the heat of competition in a $95,000 race car. I asked Joe, who had driven it on Friday, what he thought. ?It?s an easy car to drive, it?s insured (although the deductible could still be crippling) and there are only 24 cars in the field, just do it!?
So, I got ready to drive what promised to be the most potent and incredible car that I had ever experienced, and under race conditions. We did a quick familiarization with the controls and I drove it around the parking lot. That was the extent of my pre-race testing! The car is actually a 2000 SuperCup car, imported and freshened to now run in PCA as a GTC3. It?s actually the most popular car in the club now, lots of them are out there. I found it to be very comfortable and modern. Power steering, power brakes, and ABS, seem like amenities in a race car, but make no mistake; this is a single purpose thoroughbred. I was at once excited to drive this car and also worried about damaging it. Joe went over the shifting pattern and technique with me, selecting the wrong gear would probably be the easiest and most expensive mistake I could make, but I sensed that the car would actually be much more comfortable and easier to drive than my own.
The enduro started and Rick was running up front for most of his stint, having qualified the car 5th. I told Joe to tell him not to bother pushing it because once I got in the car I had no intention of stuffing passes on other cars that I also can?t afford. I was suiting up and getting ready to get in near the half way point when a full course yellow came out and Rick appeared suddenly in our pit along with three other cars that we had also agreed to fuel. It was a mad scramble and I wound up helping to fuel our car then strapping in with time to spare as Joe counted down the required 5 min for me and I headed out, the course still under yellow to retrieve some stray cars. This worked nicely, as I got two laps that allowed me to feel the car before I caught up to the queue. A few more behind the pace car and the course went green. I stood on it lightly, to let a few cars by and the track was all mine to enjoy with this phenomenal car.
I drove it very gently at first but found it very stable, predictable and comfortable. The speed just came to me and I started to get on it. It was a far cry from what I?d been used to for the last three days, instead of stumbling up the straight with a backfiring car, I was now approaching the hump (where CanAm cars had infamously done backflips in the 70?s) ready for 6th gear, at what must have been about 155mph, then heal-toe down to 4th and immediately feeding in to throttle steer through the long sweeper and then down to 3rd for the esses before powering tail-out onto the main straight under full power and up to 4th past the start/finish and into the downhill turn one where Joe is prompting me to track out hard and head for the blind crested turn two. I started to realize that I had to modify my lines from the way I was driving my own car because I was carrying so much more speed and needed more road, so I?d approach the crest at 2 more to the outside and take a blind turn in, hoping that the track hadn?t changed since the last lap, because it?s just not visible. It was just like running under the bridge at Bridgehampton in the old days, only to the left instead of right. Incredibly exhilarating stuff. My lap times were down to 1:34 quickly, and I was happy to keep it there, especially as I was starting to sense the rear tires going off, the tail was getting easier to hang out under power, so I was very gentle with throttle transitions. I was also taking great care any time I shifted diagonally through the gate (4-5, 5-4) and not letting the clutch go unless I was certain, but the shifting was really easy. Then I realized that I was soaking wet, very thirsty and my legs were cramping, so I must have been working pretty hard. Into the high speed increasing radius turn 3 I was powering out to the track out when the car slid out from under me. I put both feet in hard to spin it and almost kept it on the pavement. Near the end of a full 360 I released to back off to the outside and let oncoming cars through. It all worked fine. I selected first gear and went right back at it, then took the checker. Joe and I had a debate on the radio over who had more fun; me driving the car or him watching me enjoy it! When I brought it in the whole crew was there to see me smiling wider than my helmet port, for the first time in 4 long days. We?d managed to end on a great high, through it all.
Yours in sport,
Fast Franz
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