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1-12-2010
Happy new year to everyone.
 Colin started the new year off with a test in Daytona for the Rolex 24. He is driving for Krohn Racing, the same team he won the Grand Am championship with in 2006. What made it quite strange for me was I am racing against Colin for only the 3rd time in my life. I much prefer to race with him as it makes my job easier.
Colin was driving the #75 Ford Lola and I was engineering the #95 BMW Riley. To make matters more complicated I was staying with Colin in his motorhome at the track.
So how did all that go? Well my car ended up about .3 seconds faster than Colin went. Not that I was keeping track…yea right! In a test like this each team works on different things and times don’t matter, but heck as long as they keep track I was happy to be a little quicker. The Lola Colin is driving is known not to be really fast at Daytona but is very consistent and reliable for a 24 hour race. He will be just fine in the race. We hung out at night setting up his new, to him motorhome. We watched the BCS foot ball game, as Texas QB Colt McCoy is from Tuscola Texas, about 3 miles from Ovalo where we live and Colin grew up. If Colin had not gone to homeschool he would have gone to school in Tuscola. Too bad Colt got hurt early. The big challenge was keeping warm.
 On Saturday we had rain, snow, and sleet. With temps of 32 deg for a high it did not feel like Daytona. Ray the guy that drives Colin’s motorhome got a chance to try out all the systems and be sure things are working well. Colin and I spent one night working on a small water leak in the bathroom. After taking the valve completely apart and trying silicone, pipe tape and everything else, we decided we were not plumbers, or it just needs a new valve.
After that thrilling work we watched the Dallas NFL game and once confident the Cowboys would win switched to the Supercross race from CA. Bubba won, and it was fun to watch live racing again. So we hung out and did non racing stuff mostly. Colin says “hey lets order a pizza.” I said we are in the infield at Daytona in your motorhome, how is that going to work. Well he calls Pizza Hut and they say no problem, we can do it. In about 30 min the driver calls and says the gate guard at the tunnel won’t let him in without a pass. Out of the motorhome in 25 deg weather, in the car and pick up the pizza. And the guy forgot the bread sticks!
Man testing at Daytona is tough…LOL
Jeff Braun |
