Vortex Brake Pads 200 weekend at Mosport
2010-06-16
James Clay, Team Owner/Driver, BimmerWorld Racing
I first met the Amico Racing guys about a year ago when they came to our VA shop to look at one of our E46 cars they were considering purchasing.
My weekend started with a midnight arrival into YYZ, Toronto. I am not a big fan of lack of sleep, but it was the way it had to be to make this weekend work with my commitments to our own team and business. When I at the track after about 3 hours of sleep and a quick breakfast at the hotel, we quickly found our paddock spot, parked the rig, unloaded, registered, found our new paddock spot, parked the rig, unloaded again, and then got started on our weekend. The car arrived ready to hit the track – this is the first critical part to a successful race weekend and the first of many items that verifies that the Amico Racing guys have it together.
There were a few changes to the car since it left our stable that are allowed in the CCTCC series – most notably was a nice bump in engine displacement and some suspension work Doug had conjured up. I went to work on the Motec display to tweak the screen to show Dean what I want to see as a driver. First session out went well enough – the car handled nicely out of the box but we could identify some problems to tweak – most notably a turn entry push into the high speed turns. We added some rear rebound to slow the loading on the front in the pit lane and it didn’t work out, but it did give us direction. In a review of the data, I had carried more speed into several of the corners, likely loading the car differently in the process, thus requiring a change to the support of the suspension. There was some time in doing it this way, so that means make the car work with the different loads and change the driving style a little.
We made a change in the rear bar and front shocks and overshot the effect we wanted in session two. But in doing so, we were learning what we needed to do and also uncovering some secondary issues in the suspension tuning. Third session, we nailed our balance issue which cured the front push and also nailed a shock change that controlled the rear of the car, settling it down a little and making (both) drivers more comfortable in T2 and T4 – where you have to be at least some degree of comfortable to be fast. With the car incredibly close to optimum, it was time for Dean to turn laps and try a few things we identified in the data.
The test day was a lot of work but we made good progress. Not mentioned above, but a hugely critical component to our ability to drive, tune, and advance our efforts was the tireless work of all the guys helping us. One of those critical components that I can never seem to give enough credit for. Our car was ready to go for every session, with any of the changes we wanted, and the sessions went smoothly. Awesome work.
That night, Dino came in and we all headed out to dinner. Working on a few hours of sleep, we headed out to eat and be merry… Dean popped out early to go get sleep for his race on Saturday – smart man. The rest of us stayed, discussed the team, racing, and other less tangential thoughts – the result, another night with only a few hours sleep. When I got up (later than I wanted to), Mother Nature dashed our plans of strapping on a fresh set of rubber and showing the field the results of our work Friday. We would be putting on rain tires instead.
Rain is pesky. There is no real data analysis because the track conditions are hugely variable. So instead, Doug put on a rain setup to make the car soft enough to have some grip in the slick conditions and Dean went out to lay down some laps and experience the track wet. We had hoped it would dry for the later qualifying sessions and the race so our goal was to run for the experience and not beat up the car. Accomplished.
Our paddock was still wet for qualifying, but as we climbed the hill to pit lane, it was obvious that the track without the wind breaks was drying nicely. We had only partially adjusted the car for the wet, so we were able to call Dean in and put the full dry setup on in a matter of a few minutes. We were running intermediate tires, so the biggest change there was a pressure adjustment as they heated up. Dean put down some laps on the drying track and came out with a top 10 grid spot. Not exactly where we wanted to be, but it was in the rain. Variables. We were in a decent position for the race.
The race time is approaching and everyone in the paddock has their junior weatherman hats on. We decide with a last minute splatter of raindrops that we are going to go with a wet setup. This time, we go full wet – adjustments all around the car to shocks and a couple more tweaks. The result – Dean immediately pops up to P5 from his 8th place starting position and circulates the track as everyone on the pit wall from our team prays for more rain, making it up to 4th for a long period. Unfortunately, the rains stays away, the track begins to dry, and we struggle to maintain on the tires we chose while a couple of cars that went with a dry setup charge forward. At the end of the day, we score a top 10 finish and a good grid spot for Sunday.
It was a pleasure to work with these guys over the two days, but I have to fly out Saturday night to prepare for our next event the following weekend. The Amico guys have a great program, are fun to be around, and with a little bit of fine tuning hopefully headed to the pointy end of the field!
James Clay
BimmerWorld - Race Proven Performance
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Douglas Lovegrove, Crew Chief/Engineer, Amico Racing Inc.
Friday testing.
We had the pleasure of having James Clay from Bimmerworld Racing come out and help us this weekend, Dean and James were both on pace right away and both drivers were reporting similar feedback about the car. I stepped aside from my normal role making the calls on Friday and left it up to James to call the setup changes. We really made the most of the four 30 minute sessions on Friday and I was delighted with our progress, James had good things to say about our car and Deans driving. At the end of the day we had some good constructive criticism to go forward with and conformation that we were on the right track.
Saturday
What’s the deal with Mosport and rain? I swear that every time we go the weather is going to act up. I’ve got a new plan though; from now on I will have a local with me, kind of like having a guide when you’re touring sub Saharan Africa. I think Pontypool is the closest town so maybe I can have someone from there come out to the races to tell me what the hell the weather is going to do. All this fancy radar and Environment Canada stuff is bunk, I’m hiring an old man from Pontypool.
Saturday started off all wrong, I hate to admit to this but I drank too much on Friday night after having been in the sun all day. Saturday morning was a reminder to me why that is an idiotic idea when you’re in charge of a race team, we had practice at 8:15 or something like that, so I’m up at 5:30 and not too happy with myself. Practice was wet and we used it to try out our rain setup, the changes made to the car for a wet track are pretty straight forward everything gets softened up a bit to let the car find grip on the track. Quick chassis response and feedback to the driver are less critical in the wet as the speeds are down quite a bit. Dean felt the car was really good in the rain so we started getting ready for qualifying.
We knew the track was starting to dry but we still figured and intermediate tire would be best, you could call our car setup intermediate as well. There was rain all around us and I didn’t think we’d get through qualifying without more rain. WRONG. I should have had dry tires on the wall ready to go because I missed the boat on that one, we ended up 9th.
I waited as long as possible to make the call for the race, ten minutes to go and it was spitting, the radar showed precipitation all around and more headed our way. Full rain setup all the way, James even had a more aggressive rain setup then we normally run and with the amount of rain that we had coming why not! Well things got off to a good start with Dean picking up spots and running as high as 4th, but as the track dried and the rain that was coming; didn’t, we found ourselves going backwards at an alarming rate. Still 7th wasn’t too bad.
Sunday
Blue skies and Sunshine again, and being that there was a NASCAR race too this afternoon the track filled up with race fans to take in the festivities. Practice went nowhere as we had an issue with the steering shaft and Dean wasn’t feeling too confident in the car as a result. We got that taken care of and focused on the race.
With a dry track and a fast car dean when to work early picking up spots and putting in some fast times we were running 5 but Dean couldn’t let up with a the Mitsubishi EVO of Tom Kwok and the Lombardi Honda of Alex Healy were right behind him. Dean was gaining on Greg Pootmans in 4th when he pushed just a little too hard and went off giving up two sports to Kwok and Healy. I told Dean on the radio, “no big deal we’re faster and you get them back in two laps”. Sure enough dean was making passes by the next lap but he just couldn’t get away from the EVO, just too much power out of the corners with the 4 wheel drive system putting it down. Dean’s only chance was to get buy in a corner, the EVO could not corner as well as our BMW. Dean had his hands full because Kwok didn’t want to give up the spot and was making it pretty clear on the track by blocking and closing doors where he could to keep Dean behind him. At some point the cars touched tires and it was hard enough to damage our suspension and cause a trip into the tire wall. Dean was pretty upset and I was mad as hell but again who can I be mad at? Better to just focus on the next race………….
Dean Fantin, Driver, Amico Racing Inc.
Well, I think the only way I could describe this weekend is, “bitter sweet”. I was very excited to have James Clay from Bimmerworld come down for testing on Friday and to help up setup for Saturday’s race. On Friday I drove the first 15 minutes of each session and James would drive the last 15 minutes so that we could get his thoughts on what the car was doing and compare it to my feedback. We made many changes on the car early in the day to establish a direction to go in. Then there were a few minor adjustments that made the car more manageable so I didn’t have to push the limit so hard to reach the same lap times. I felt very confident going into Saturday morning.
Saturday was calling for rain and rain it did. It stopped just before qualifying and it was cool so we made the decision to go out with the rain setup. Surprisingly the track dried up quickly and was not able to throw down fast lap times and we ended up in 9th position. I wasn’t too thrilled about that, but it was a difficult judgment call for the setup.
Once again just before the race it stop raining but the radar showed some rain coming in so we decided to go out with our full rain setup. Half the teams decided to go out on the dry setup, I knew I had to capitalize in the beginning of the race in case the rain let up. The start was pretty hairy with cars being loose all over. There was a good hole on the outside of turn two so I dove in there pretty hard which was perfect because it was the wet line on the track. I picked up two positions and fought for another two positions throughout the race and was catching 4th. Towards the end of the race the track dried up and I wasn’t able to lay the proper lap times needed to defend 6th and 7th position. Fortunately I was able to hold off Alex Healy in the last two laps. I wasn’t thrilled with this result but myself and the team put forth our best efforts. I would have to say that this race was the most fun I’ve had in the rain, the car was amazing! Being able to push the braking zones to the point where the rear of the car is just barely coming around setting up almost the perfect drift into the corners kept my heart in my throat the whole time with a huge rush of adrenaline!
Sunday was calling for nothing but sunshine and I was anxious to see how the race would go seeing how the front of the grid was very close. I had a lot of confidence in the car since it was so balanced and was great on long runs. The start of the race started off pretty aggressive with Alex Healy pushing me to the inside of the track heading into the first corner. I held my spot and battled with my mirror resting on the other car. I then proceeded to battle with Gary Kwok in his Mitsubishi and forced him into a mistake. I pulled away quickly and was catching Pootman in 4th. About mid race I spun the car around between 5a and 5b. I lost two positions and half a straight away on them. I quickly caught back up to them and got by but Tom Kwok in the Mitsubishi dove hard on the inside of me in turn 10 pushing me off track. Latter I had a great run on him coming out of turn two and I decided to make my move on the outside since he was protecting the inside line. I dove in hard and kwok came across the track and my right front touched him and bent the tie rod. I continued on into turn four knowing that the front end was out of alignment, I could feel it pull to one side and was seeing some smoke. As I got to the top of the crest the strut broke and pulled me off track hard and into the wall. It was a horrible feeling knowing I let the team down and how hard the team has worked to get the car ready for this venue. Once again we were 4th fastest on track and we didn’t finish the race. I was incredibly frustrated.
Like I had said, bitter sweet. We had a very fast car and made some improvements with myself and the car, but at the end of the day we were left with bad luck once again. I’m looking forward for the next venue at ICAR, Mirabel Quebec and to get back into the seat and on top of the charts!!
Amico Racing is participating in the Castrol Canadian Touring Car Championship for their second year in 2010, last year they finished 9th in the Championship. Amico Racing is supported by the Labours Union, KML Building Solutions, Aon Insurance and many more. Check them out at http://www.amicoracing.com/