Tales of a Lap Puppy
From: "Attila the Fun" asam@cris.com
Subject: (rx7) [misc] Memoirs of a Lap Puppy (long)
Date: Wed, May 17, 2000, 12:14 PM
First, there was the guy with his brakes on fire. That was my first clue
that this event was going to be really unusual. Steve Cole had definitely
put the "fire" in his 500+ hp Firebird that shot flames from the brakes at
the end of the main straight. Sure, Rick Potter had tried to tell me--at
the same time he was telling me I really didn't want to do a One Lap of
America. Since he was starting to sound like common sense, I ignored him.
Commonsensical people rarely have fun.
Steve was Rick's co-driver last year. Now, he was doing the event in his
own car and setting the brakes on fire. No common sense, there, eh? (Rick
and all his friends are from Canada. Canadians end many of their sentences
with "eh". During the One Lap, I became a de facto, honorary Canadian,
since all the Americans assumed I was from north of the border, eh.)
Saturday, May 6th, was taken up primarily by tech and registration. The
cars coming in provided an extraordinary range of automotive technology from
the Renntech V-12 Mercedes and Hennessey Venom at one end of the scale to an
Austin Mini-Cooper and the "Honda Death Car" at the other. We had several
hours of "Look at that!" and "Did you see...?" Many of them were family
cars with the required decals; many were full-race machines that were only
on the road because the owner had kept the original license plate from 14
years ago somewhere in the attic.
Finally, everyone was present, and it was time for the qualifying event, a
single, standing-start lap of Gingerman Raceway. Rick had been assigned
number 4, which really intimidated him, since it was based on some formula
for predicting success. Sitting in front of the number 5 Cobra, a
class-winner from a previous year and the Renntech Mercedes (640 hp and 600
lb. of torque), Rick felt...shall we say...vulnerable. I assured him that
he could do it, since Brock had faith in him.
And they were off! The bellowing 600+ hp monsters in front of Rick roared
onto the track. Then Rick, almost silent by comparison, pulled up to the
start/finish line and dashed for turn 1. He was having a good run--smooth,
professional, no histrionics. It looked like a high-placed finish, for
sure. He rushed toward the last turn before the main straight, and the
Great God Murphy reached out His gnarled finger and "blessed" the RX-7.
Like any good driver, Rick knows that you're supposed to look where you want
to go. So, he looked at the turn 11 apex. As his brakes failed to slow the
car, he gazed mournfully at the apex, watching it intently as it slipped
further and further behind. (This proved to be a harbinger of things to
come.) Luckily, the pit-out was just across the road, and Rick made a loop
over the additional asphalt that let him get back on track and finish the
run. However, he had lost 3 seconds and fell from 4th to 15th. We
reassured each other that it really didn't matter, since there were no
points for qualifying.
The One Lap becomes a sort of traveling community in the tradition of
nomadic groups from time immemorial. It has its prominent citizens (John
Hennessey, Chuck Mallett), its scruffy citizens (the guys in the Honda Death
Car), its wealthy citizens (Jerry Churchill, Dan Corcoran), and its poor
citizens (me). In between the extremes is a broad middle-class, folks like
Rick. The upper stratum of the community is, as you might suspect, marked
by money. The Hennessy Venom upgrade to the Viper you already bought is
$131,000 according to Motor Trend Magazine. When approached by Jerry
Churchill about selling one of his Corvettes, Chuck Mallett reportedly asked
$200,000. Jerry declined, bought a Viper and spent $150,000 upgrading it.
No one even asked what the Renntech Mercedes cost. There are some things
better not known. To compete in this group, you really need a quarter of a
million dollars up front.
As with any community, the air is rife with rumors and speculation. As much
as possible, I'll weed out the less plausible rumors in this record.
After qualifying, the community fragmented into various groups and invaded
South Haven, MI for dinner. After that, there was a good deal of
socializing in the halls of the motel until bedtime. The One Lap of America
2000 was well and truly under weigh.
Sunday, May 6. Now it's serious. We're here to kick butt and take names.
A moment of typical One Lap: The scheduled two, 3-lap events have been
compressed into one, 4-lap event. No explanation. God (Brock Yates) has
spoken, and thus it shall be. All the lap dogs shrug and say their
catechism: "There is only one rule. There are no rules."
The "lap dogs", BTW, are the people who have done more than one One Lap of
America. Newbies are known as "lap puppies", and those who finish in the
top 10 are "Big Dogs".
The green flag waved and the Vipers, the tuner Corvettes (Mallett and
Lingenfelter) and all the other mega-horsepower cars roared out of the pits.
Just in front of Rick was his good buddy Dan Corcoran in a super-charged
Firebird. This car has every legal trick part known to man. It also has a
"body-in-white", a special, lightened, stiffened chassis sold to racing
teams. After doing the development on the original Firebird, everything was
transferred to the body-in-white...including the VIN plate and license tags.
Then there was Rick: Stock engine, full interior. He had the PFS go-fast
goodies, but that was it. Compared to the thousands of cubic inches in
front of him, he looked a little out of place.
As Rick pulled out, I called to him our private joke, "Remenber, we're here
to have fun!" 'Round and 'round they went! And when they stopped, Rick was
8th fastest. Rick was bewildered. He was sure there was a timing error.
How could he have leapfrogged over the cars that qualified faster? How
could we be ahead of Cam Worth's 550 hp 3-rotor. I just smiled and assured
him, "We're good." He walked away, shaking his head to look at the posted
results, again, sure that they had changed for the worse.
Now, it was White Rabbit time. "We're late! We're late for a very
important date! No time to plan. No time to think. We're late! We're
late! We're late!" We packed the car, and headed for Michigan
International.
All the way to MIS, Rick reiterated his disbelief over the results and
predicted that Cam and the other high horsepower guys are going to run away
and hide from us on the high-speed banked oval. I just smiled and said,
"We'll see."
When we arrived at MIS, a NASCAR driving school was in progress. The
roundy-rounders thundered in circles. You could tell that road racing was
not a high priority here, since there was grass growing up through parts of
the infield track. The storm clouds that had followed us from Gingerman
opened up and traumatized the NASCAR guys. For them, "rain" is a
four-letter word. The remainder of the school was cancelled, and those of
us who fear no water prepared to hit it. This time, the Great God Murphy
smiled on us and rained on the Vipers. They went out and demonstrated that
those huge tires make great squeegees. By the time Rick got on the track,
it was dry, and he could get down and boogie. Midway through the boogie, he
noticed that he was down on power at the top end. As a result, he was
limited to 150 - 155 mph on the oval, but he still demonstrated
extraordinary skill in braking and navigating the infield turns.
After the run, it was White Rabbit time, again. I loaded the car, and Rick
went to check the prelminary results. When I looked up, he was sort of
staggering back to the car with the general demeanor of one of those people
you see in the photographs of Hiroshima after the Big One. Immediately
concerned, I asked if he was OK. He alleged that he was, but he sure didn't
look it. So I asked what the problem was.
"We ran 4th," he croaked.
I made all the appropriate noises about "Yippee!" and "We rule!" and "You
da man!"
"No. No." he said. "You don't understand. We ran 4th overall."
"And this is bad, because...?" I asked.
Rick spluttered over my failure to realize that he had announced the utterly
impossible. He stoutly maintained that there had been a mistake.
I suggested that we not point it out.
He wanted to hang around until the official results came out, but I knew we
had a long road to Atlanta and said so. He reluctantly agreed, and I put
him in the passenger seat (he was clearly in no condition to drive) and
headed for the gate. After stopping at the gate, I looked both ways before
pulling out. As I looked to the right, I caught sight of Rick's face. The
first thought that went through my head was, "What do I remember from the
Boy Scout Handbook about treating people in shock?"
Just as we were leaving, Cam was on track and passing two cars on the oval
when the 3-rotor car belched smoke. We learned, later, he had blown a
turbo.
Over the next few hours, the color came back into Rick's face, and his
speech returned to a semblance of normalcy. We settled into the rythm of
the One Lap: Drive until your eyes don't focus; wake up co-driver; sleep;
repeat, as necessary. I also learned that Rick is fiercely competitive.
Those of you who have met him know him as a cheerful, friendly, easygoing
sort of fellow. After dark during One Lap, that all changes. He grows
2-inch fangs. His hairline marches down to and merges with his eyebrows.
His eyes glow with a feral light, and he begins chanting in a low, guttural
voice, "I must kill them all. Kill Them All! KILL THEM ALL!"
I found this somewhat disturbing. However, it was the source of our private
joke about just having fun.
The trip was long and annoying. Rick had warned me that the real wear and
tear on a car came from the highways. It was true. We hit one place in
Kentucky where the highway department had apparently not felt compelled to
connect a bridge to the pavement. I was asleep at the time. When the
"WHAM!" of the shocks hitting their stops jolted the car like a hammer blow,
I leaped a foot straight up in the air and thought we'd had a collision. A
millisecond of observation showed no vehicles or other objects close enough
to have recently hit us, so I thought Rick had fallen asleep and run off the
road (Sorry, Rick. How could I doubt you?). I asked if he wanted me to
drive. When he got his teeth unclenched from the impact, he said, "No" and
assured me that all was well. He also asked, if I really thought I wanted
to put my car through something like that. At that point, a Humvee seemed
like the only reasonable vehicle for this event. We found out later that
the GT1 Toyota Supra had bent a wheel on the same bump.
The other annoying thing is that the One Lap folks had taken pains to find
us some really fun roads to drive. Curvy, scenic, great stuff.
Unfortunately, we hit them at 3:00 a.m., when there was nothing to see but
the small fraction in our headlights. There we were, ripping up and down
through the mountains with trees on both sides and an absolute certainty
that The Suicide Deer was waiting behind everyone of them.
Finally, about dawn, we could see a little bit. A pair of headlights
appeared in the rearview mirror and began tailgating us down the
mountainside. Rick was driving briskly and surely around turns that would
put a smile on the face of any sportscar nut. The headlights were glued to
our back bumper. When we came to a passing zone, Rick slowed, expecting to
see one of the One Lap cars piloted by one of the less intellectually gifted
members of the group. Instead, to our amazement, we were passed, then left
in the dust by a 15-passenger Plymouth van that demonstrated that two wheels
are all you really need to go around a corner. I tried to get his license
number, hoping to get him as co-driver for next year's One Lap.
During the drive, Rick noticed that the brakes felt like they were warped.
Remember the problem at turn 11 at Gingerman? It had come back to haunt us.
After some time, we diagnosed the problem as Chernobyl brake pads. It seems
that Rick's aggressively late braking was melting the pads and leaving a
residue on the rotors. After arriving at Road Atlanta (with no stops for
sleep or other such foolishness), we borrowed some sandpaper from the nice
folks at Panoz and pulled the brakes.
Rick sanded the rotors to get rid of the melted residue, while I scraped the
mirror-finish brake pads on rocks embedded in the roadway to return them to
a more abrasive state. We bolted everything back together and took a few
autocross runs around the parking lot to test the brakes. And then it was
time for Road Atlanta.
The first run went fairly well, but the loss of power that we had seen at
MIS was back. Our air intake temperatures were at 190 degrees, and the
engine had only been calibrated to 140. We let the car cool down and tested
the brakes. They had turned to excrement, again. So...pull the brakes,
sand the brakes, put them back on the car. Back to the false grid. After
Rick pulled onto the track, Brock Yates stopped by to ask how "the little
car" was doing. (Whenever we spoke during the rest of the event, he
referred to it as "the little car".) I told him what I knew, and he asked
if we would be able to get it running better. I assured him there was
nothing more dear to our hearts than getting it to run better.
We interrupt this narrative to deliver a personal opinion: I think that
Brock really hoped Rick would do well, because it would give him something
to hold up when people started saying, "You can't compete without loads of
money."
Back to the narrative...
The second event finished decently, but not spectacularly, and it was White
Rabbit time again.
We were required to make a 90-mile detour to the Carolina Rod Shop, where we
got lunch and a quick tour of the facilities. Super nice folks. If you
have a Chevy, talk to them about it.
While en route to Sebring, we called Peter Farrell and described what we
were seeing. He offered some advice and said they would try to duplicate
the conditions in the shop.
The drive to Sebring was long, but uneventful, straight down I-95.
Somewhere in Georgia we began killing bugs by the millions. For us, this
was messy. For the guys in the Lister-Corvette, it was almost
life-threatening. Since the car has no top and has a windshield only one
foot high, the occupants had to don their helmets to keep from being pelted
to death by bugs. The Lister was everyone's favorite. It is the ultimate,
balls-to-to-the-wall, we-are-not-constrained-by-common-sense sportscar.
500+ hp and 1880 lb. A little short on creature comforts, though. For the
guys in the 1st-place, 777-hp Viper, it was the end. A tractor-trailer
driver pulled from the side of the road without signalling. The Viper hit
the trailer wheels and was totalled. Since the car was a full-tilt racing
machine, it had a roll cage. As a result the occupants were not injured.
We were deep into our second night with no sleep and no shower and feeling
like second-hand manure. Rick and I got to talking about the One Lap and
how it is perceived by the people on the list. He was a little bemused at
some of the feelings and attitudes of those who have never done the One Lap.
I said that for many of the people who only dream of doing it, we represent
an ideal that they carry with them as a charm against mundane reality. "We
are living the dream," I said.
Rick fixed me with the sort of look you would give to a person who needs
counseling and prescription drugs and said, "We are living the nightmare."
We finally settled in a motel near the track and anticipated a glorious 3
hours of sleep. An hour and a half later, Rick woke me up and said, "We
need to fix the brakes." He went to start the job, while I crawled through
the shower. With freshly-sanded rotors and roughened pads, we made our way
to the track. By getting there early, we got a patch of shade and began to
unload the car, which was immediately covered with "love bugs". These
Florida insects seem to spend their lives in conjugal bliss. Everywhere you
looked there were seemingly inseparable pairs. Occasionally, the larger
female would take off flying and dragging the smaller male by his...um,
er...well, you know. I've known some married guys who were kind of like
that.
Cam Worth rejoined the One Lap there. When he went roaring down the
straight, Rick noted that it looked like he was sucking the trees down with
the tremendous force of the 3-rotor motor. In spite of that, Rick's lap
time was about a half second faster than Cam's in the first session. Once
off the track, it was time, once again, to do the brakes.
Presenting "A One Lap Moment"---
Rick and I started jacking up the car with his stock scissors jack, which
didn't work well in the Florida sand. Tamara Hunter, a competitor within
our class noticed the problem and immediately offered us the use of her
hydraulic jack. Rick soon had his head under the car to find and release
the caliper bolts. Another competitor walked over and put a jackstand under
the car saying that he didn't want to see Rick get hurt. Cam Worth inquired
what the problem was. We explained that the brake pads were melting. Rick
noted that he had never had this problem with Hawk Blues (we were using
Performance Friction 90s). Cam said the he would give us his Hawk Blues as
soon as he finished his second run. Bear in mind, we were not only his
competitors in class, but sponsored by his business competitor, as well. In
my mind, he showed himself to be a gentleman in the oldest and truest sense
of the word. This is one of the glorious things about One Lap. It's a lot
of really nice people.
Rick's times at Sebring were very good, especially when you consider that he
had never seen the track, and we were down on power. As a bonus, the yellow
Lingenfelter Corvette spun out, and we moved up to 7th overall. After a
stop at the Race Rock Cafe, we headed north. As we discussed the day's
happenings and the fact that one of the 650 hp cars was now behind us in the
standings, we went into full Blues Brothers mode singing our theme song as
we roared through the dark of Georgia at midnight, Queen's "Another One
Bites the Dust".
Bomp! Bomp! Bomp! Another One Bites the Dust. hahaha
Bomp! Bomp! Bomp! Another One Bites the Dust.
And another one's gone. And another one's gone.
And Another One Bites the Dust.
This was punctuated by a high five accompanied by sounds of maniacal glee.
Several sleep deprivation studies have documented that bizarre behavior can
result after a few days.
Related to the "living the dream" conversation from the previous night is
the "spreading the joy" concept. I mentioned to Rick that one of the things
about driving an RX-7 (especially my convertible) is that I often saw people
who seemed to take joy just knowing that there is something wonderful in the
world. I can remember feeling like that the first time I saw a Mercedes
300SL raise its gullwing doors or when I saw the sun rising over a
Lamborghini Miura. In the dark of the night, "joy" was not a word that Rick
had on the tip of his tongue, so he regarded my dissertaion with a jaundiced
eye. However, when we stopped for gas, somewhere in Georgia, a guy asked
about the car and what we were doing. I gave him my 15-second explanation
of One Lap (Starting in Michigan, we do one racetrack per day down to
Sebring, back up to Lime Rock and then back to Michigan). He said, "That
sounds like that movie with Burt Reynolds!"
I explained that the One Lap was the sanitized version of the Cannonball
Baker Sea-to-Shining-Sea Memorial Trophy Dash. And then came the joy--I
could see the glow in his eyes and read the thoughts behind it: "It wasn't
just a movie! It's real...and I saw it!" Tired, sore and uncomfortable as
I was, I felt good. In some small way, I had made his life better. To him,
the world was a brighter place, because there was something wonderful in it.
Unlike several competitors, we made it through the Carolinas without feeding
the "bears". Rick and I had agreed, before starting, that we would run 5 to
7 mph over the limit. Although the Valentine One reliably warned us, we
could have probably got by without it. The disadvantage to this strategy
was that we didn't get to VIR in time to catch a few winks in a motel. We
washed the Florida love bugs off the car and indulged in a philosophical
discussion of the implications of paranormal phenomena over breakfast. We
noted that it was Wednesday, a difficult time for some One Lappers. In
previous years, some people would get to Wednesday morning and walk away
screaming that "You people are Nucking Futs!" (or something like that),
board an airplane, and go home.
I dropped Rick off at the VIR south course, so that he could walk the track.
Meanwhile, I went to the paddock area at the north course and unloaded the
car. Shortly after I got back to the south course, Martin Mikhail stopped
by with a care package from John Duff at PFS. (Thanks, Martin.) This
included some Performance Friction 93 brake pads and a men's magazine. For
some reason, John had instructed Martin to get a picture of Rick "reading"
the magazine in from of the RX-7. Since John had moved heaven and earth to
find the brake pads and get them to us, Rick thought it was the least he
could do. Taking his position in front of the car, he randomly flipped open
the magazine. There appeared a picture of a young...uh, lady trying to
touch opposing corners of the page with her toes. At that moment, one of
the competitors who is a doctor happened to look over Rick's shoulder. Rick
asked for the doctor's opinion. He replied that it reminded him too much of
work and left.
The run on the south course wasn't bad; neither was it spectacular. We
maintained our overall position, as well as our class standing. We still
had the high-end loss of power that we had suffered at Road Atlanta and
Sebring. Between runs, we needed to modify the PF 93s with a grinder. No
one in the pits seemed to have thought to pack one, and the locals couldn't
think of any shop nearby. (It's a rural area.) Finally, one guy recalled
having seen a small lawn mower shop. We reasoned that they must have a
grinder for sharpening blades. The mower shop proved to be something out of
a Tennessee Williams play. When we got there, the owner simply handed us a
grinder and pointed us out the back door to a well-used rusty vise on a
stump. While Rick shaped the backing plates to our needs, I fended off the
ticks in the surrounding high grass, and the old man fussed at his ancient,
senile wife, instructing her to not put her fingers in the fan. The old man
charged us a dollar for the use of the grinder, then settled back into his
rocking chair, as we pulled out of the driveway and headed back to VIR.
Moving to the north course, the results were similar to the morning's,
though we were even more down on power in the afternoon heat. Then, it was
White Rabbit time again.
This time, the scenic part of the trip came in the daylight as we took
highway 501 to I-81. Rick and many other, however, failed to appreciate the
natural beauty, simply because of the idiots in front of us who could not
find the rightmost pedal nor determine its use. While Rick slept, I drove
up I-81, waving at the occasional One Lap car that passed us. At one point,
I looked over and into the eyes of the great man, himself, as he was
chauffered past us in a dark blue Jaguar. As Brock passed at about 85 mph,
he blessed us with a pontificial wave. My first thought was that I could
tail him and let him be my "front door". His car wasn't marked by all those
gawdy stickers, so the police wouldn't be attracted to him, and he could
find the radar traps for us. Great idea, eh? Rick opened one bloodshot eye
and said, "He doesn't like being tailed. Don't do it." So much for great
ideas. We talked with Peter Farrell via cell phone about our power loss.
Based on the intake temperatures we were seeing, Peter said we were losing
about 60 hp.
In the wee hours of the next morning, we arrived in Connecticut and got a
room for a glorious two hours of sleep, after putting on the Performance
Friction 93s during a sudden downpour.
Lime Rock is a gorgeous facility and certainly had the best breakfast of
anyplace we went--not that it did Rick any good. Having been wrought up 26
hours a day since we started, he would take a little orange juice or coffee,
if I pressed him to do so, but nothing else. He said he usually lost weight
during One Lap, and I know the reason why. Rick didn't know the course, and
the track was wet in the morning, so we didn't do well. The Daytona Cobra
got black-flagged by the noise-Nazis, and the driver was absolutely livid
about getting a DNF, so I didn't feel so bad about our finish. (Lime Rock
is under a court-ordered limit of 89 decibels.) For the afternoon session,
the Cobra owner came up with a bit of Yankee ingenuity, using worm clamps to
hold impromptu mufflers made from soda cans on the ends of his side pipes.
It worked. That's all that counts.
Between sessions, someone stopped to talk to Rick about his modifications.
As Rick was showing the PFS intercooler, he found that the intercooler seal
was loose. As a result the intercooler was sucking hot air directly from
the back of the radiator. There wasn't time to fix it before the second
session, but, at last, we had an answer to our miseries. Rick had a
slightly better run in the afternoon than in the morning. Then we spent
three hours pulling everything out, fixing the seal with some donated duct
tape, and putting it all back together again. Between the relatively poor
race results and the time spent doing the repairs, Rick was not in a good
mood. Like me, he puts working on cars right up there with root canals on
the old fun-meter. I wasn't terribly happy, myself, but--Mr. Sunshine that
I am--I preferred to look on the bright side. We had an answer to the high
intake temperatures and the power loss problem. White Rabbit time.
Shortly after leaving Lime Rock, we stopped for gas. A 10- or 11-year-old
kid pedalled up on his bicycle. His eyes grew round, and he asked, "Is that
a racecar?" I assured him that it was, and Rick confirmed it. "Wow!" he
exclaimed, and he had the joy. There was something wonderful in the world,
and he had seen it.
We drove through upstate New York to the little town of Wyoming, where we
were required to stop at the Cannonball Pub. We were given a box lunch and
sent on our way. It was a fairly easy night, as One Lap nights go. We
found a hotel near Nelson Ledges about 3:00 a.m. and did not (Thank you,
Lord.) have to disassemble and reassemble the brakes.
We arrived at Nelson Ledges in good order. Rick walked the track, and I
unloaded the car. The track was wet, and more clouds threatened us. Nelson
Ledges had not changed since I took my first SCCA drivers school there in
1970. I was amazed that a track's surface could stay that bad for so long
without simply disintegrating. One of the Track Time instructors told me
that they won't conduct drivers school there because of the potential damage
to students' cars. However, they did conduct police training sessions
there, because the surface was as bad as any rutted and potholed city
street. In spite of all that, Rick did fairly well there, although he lost
10 points of our cushion to Dan Corcoran in the 600-hp Firebird. We had
some of our power back, though the car seemed to be running rich (which led
us to suspect a clogged catalyst). We were still in 7th place overall and
had a 60 point cushion for 1st in class.
Then, disasters struck. The SUV fielded by the Carolina Rod Shop went off
course and flipped in the muddy earth beside the track. The roof was
smashed between the roll bar and the back of the hood. Rumors flew that the
driver was unable to feel or use his arms and legs. The gloom of the dark
and rainy clouds was matched by the mood of the normally upbeat One Lappers.
Those who saw the damaged vehicle vowed to get a full roll cage as soon as
they got home. In that cheery atmosphere, Rick took to the track...and
flew. I was amazed. He didn't just drive well; he drove brilliantly.
Halfway through the second lap, he was within a split second of passing
Corcoran's car and reclaiming those lost in-class points. Suddenly, the
rear of the RX-7 twitched about 3 inches. Rick over-corrected a
hairsbreadth. The car swung about 6 inches too far to the other side. Rick
caught it, but over corrected again and spun! As soon as the number Cobra
had passed, Rick screamed back onto the track and in one breathtaking lap
caught the Cobra before the end of the session.
19 seconds. For every second, one place in class. From first to twentieth.
Rick was inconsolable. "I gave it away!" he cried. "I gave away
everything--first in class, the One Lap, everything!" White Rabbit time.
It was a long night. Rick was very hard on himself, in spite of my
protestations as to how well he had driven and that anybody can spin (even
me). He was certain that our previously certain class win was history and
that we must have dropped from 7th to at least 15th place. It was like the
line from "Casey at the Bat": "There was no joy in Mudville." There was no
joy in the yellow RX-7.
We returned to South Haven to the Guesthouse Inn. Rick's wife had flown in,
and he went to her for comfort. Later, she told me his first words were, "I
gave it away. I gave it away."
Saturday dawned crisp and windy. When we arrived at the track, we found we
had slipped to 9th overall - not 15th. Our cushion of class points was down
to only 5. I tried to paint the brightest picture. "We're still in the top
10, and we're still number 1 in class. All you have to do is cruise through
the day like you did last Sunday, and it's our's."
Rick was having none of it. All he had to do is screw up once, and all was
lost. So deep was his gloom that it seemed like the clouds followed him
wherever he walked. At the end of the first session, though, my optimism
was justified. Eighth overall and an extra 5 points in class. I didn't
dwell on the fact that the 10-point lead could be lost in the afternoon.
Brock had spoken: There would be a final, one-timed-lap event after the
scheduled 3-lap event. If Corcoran was faster in both by even a thousandth
of a second, he could still tie us for first. If Rick slipped lower than
second in either, the first place trophy would go to Corcoran.
Rick was grim. I was persistently upbeat. I think he wanted to kill me.
The, a ray of sunshine. Bill Wilson stopped by to tell us that he had been
on the other side of the track at Nelson Ledges and that Rick's car had hit
a puddle. At last, Rick had an answer to the question, "What went wrong?"
The cars lined up for the final time. Up among the giants, the Vipers
circled and snarled at each other. The entire week had come down to a
toss-up between them. The Renntech Mercedes snapped at their heels. The
silver Michelin Viper, driven with perfect balance by some young hired
ninja, zipped into turn one. John Hennessy roared after it in the Venom,
wheels squalling, all 650 horses screaming for blood. In a
heart-in-your-throat display of ferocity, the Venom clearly beat the silver
Viper, almost catching it before the end of the third lap.
They took their cool-down lap and lined up again. The hired assassin in the
silver Viper was icy calm--no trace of emotion, no hint of concern.
Hennessy had the trophy, if he simply hung on, but his blood was up. He
wanted the silver Viper in his teeth. Again, the silver one leaped down the
track. Again, the Venom went sqalling after it. In the short space of a
half lap, the Venom was clearly reeling the other car in. Suddenly, the
Venom sent up a shower of dust. He had slipped off the edge of the track!
He...had...lost.
The crowd went wild! The previously imperturbable ninja crossed the finish
line with his fist out the window and raised as though grasping victory from
the very air above the start/finish line.
I turned to Rick. His face was pale. Panic clawed at the edges of his
eyes. He saw his own future in Hennessy's defeat. One mistake, one tiny
error, and it was all gone forever. We turned and walked silently across
the pit lane to the RX-7. Rick entered the car and donned his helmet. As
he pulled out, I quietly called out our private joke, "Remember to have
fun."
Then I went to stand by Big Jim, a guy who looks like Paul Bunyan and who
has two stop watches on his clipboard. Rick drove. Lord! He drove! He
beat his own best time by 2 seconds. Cool-down lap. Line up, again. I
turned to where Rick's wife waited in the second level of the timing and
scoring tower, gave her a thumbs-up and a confident smile. She beamed with
pride and excitement. I turned back to the start/finish line as Rick pulled
up. Again, the thumbs-up. Again, the confident smile.
Behind the smile, a tape-loop was on automatic, infinite replay.
[oh...dear...God...please don't let him slip]
He took the green and drove the way I knew and loved--smooth, precise, no
fuss, no muss, no bother. It's uncomfortable when you don't breathe for one
minute and 40 seconds. Then it was over. Re-start lungs. Breathe deeply.
Smile.
While Rick took his cool-down and went to the pits, the next run group
started. Corcoran started. He had been under the car all morning,
adjusting the rear suspension, hoping for another second per lap. He drove
well, giving it all he had. "All he had" was three seconds slower than
Rick's time for three laps. Rick walked up to where Big Jim and I stood
while Corcoran was on his cool-down lap. He was relaxed--One Lap was over
for him. He chatted with those around us, cool, not asking how he had done.
Finally, I leaned over and said in a low voice, "You beat Danny by three
seconds."
Watching his face was like watching the sun come up. His smile threatened
to split his face. We embraced. He walked across pit lane, a little dazed,
almost getting run down by a Mustang he didn't see, and went to share the
news with his wife. I turned back to the track.
Corcoran took the green for his last, timed lap. He pushed himself to his
limit. Exitting the last turn on the straight, his tires screamed his fury;
his supercharged V8 bellowed his frustration. The stopwatch went "click".
I was very proud of myself--I waited three, full seconds before I turned to
Big Jim and screamed, "WHAT DID HE DO? WHAT DID HE DO? WHAT DID HE DO?"
Big Jim cocked an eyebrow at me and slowly consulted the stopwatch, in case
it might have changed or something. Then he drawled, "One minute.
Forty-ONE seconds."
A glacial calm settled over me. For me, One Lap was well and truly over.
Then a little voice in the back of my head said, "Five days. Fi-i-i-ive
da-a-a-ays! 'We're not gonna make it. We're overmatched. We're gonna
lo-o-o-ose!' for fi-i-i-ive da-a-a-ays!"
Paybacks are h*ll. I put on my best poker face and walked quickly across
the pit lane and up the steps to the second level of the timing and scoring
tower, where Rick, his wife and his friends waited. When I walked into the
room, Rick stopped talking in mid-sentence and looked at me as though I were
a surgeon stepping out of the operating room with bloody hands. I stepped
into the silence, rested my fists on a table, let my shoulders slump, looked
down, and shook my head.
"Rick, it's too bad you didn't go a little faster on the last lap." (Pause.
Rick was no longer breathing. If I'd had a stethescope, I'm sure I would've
detected no heartbeat. Gotcha.) You only beat Dan by one second."
Rick's actions:
1. Mentally review what George just said.
2. Resume breathing.
3. Begin period of extended jubilation.
After a period of celebration, Rick's professionalism reasserted itself. He
assumed there would be pictures, so we rushed back to the motel and washed
the car. Then we scrubbed ourselves and returned to the track looking like
a pair of choirboys for the banquet.
We still hadn't heard the official results (Big Jim wasn't an official
timer.) There was still a smidgen of doubt. We waited. Finally, they
began the awards. A countdown. Tenth. Ninth. "Eighth place. Rick Potter
and George Samuels."
Rick and I quickly took ourselves to the podium. Although he is normally
personable and loquacious, he had nothing to say other than "Thank you." I
wasn't about to steal his moment, so I said nothing. We smiled into the TV
camera, then took our seats. We waited. At last, they began the
presentation of the class awards. "First Place, GT2. Rick Potter and
George Samuels."
Rick rushed to the podium and grasped the trophy. Again, we said nothing.
We resumed our seats. The rest of the evening was a blur as I relaxed in
the warm glow of a truly happy man.
George Samuels
Honorary Canadian
By the Grace of Brock (and Rick Potter), a Big Dog at last...eh
--