My experience in Motorsports - GT4 European Series

[psychoazubi]

Soo I'm taking part in the European GT4 Series and want to write about my journey as I'm totally new to the professional motorsport. We are taking part with one of 8 KTM X-Bow GT4's as a Cup-Series inside the European GT4 Series. All cars are prepared by Reiter Engineering. A team consists of two young drivers, two engineering students and one management/marketing student (which is me). As a management student, I also take the role of the Team leader of the car.
I'll tell you more about the concept later, because today was our first day at the track and we came home pretty late and the day tomorrow starts pretty early.

So here we are, Race 1 in Monza. Our first day ever in professional Motorsports:

We arrived at the track, our car is already here and looks pretty good:

Spoiler: Our KTM

And then the stress took over; First we had a schooling about the whole project and got some more information regarding the technical regulations and such. Both our drivers didn't drive in GT4 before and so we started to practice driver changes. This took much longer than expected. First problem occured; How to handle the seatbelts while changing the seat of the drivers? So the next our passed while fitting some stickers so that the seatbelts won't fall under the seat while we change drivers in the race:

Spoiler: Searching for the optimal position to stick the belts to the car

Goal from Hans Reiter: No more than 30 seconds for a driver change during the race!

Time passed, technical scrutineering began and went good until we drove into the scrutineering box to measure the high of the car; Balance of Performance gave us a minimum of 232 mm ground clearance on the rear of the car. Laser scanner only measured 227 mm. So, back to the pits and adjust the car:
First failure: We still had the Michelin Tires on the car in a series that has Pirelli as the only tire supplier.
Second failure: The laser scanner can only measure up to 227 mm, which is very every KTM could not pass the scrutineering. So back to the scrutineering box and measure with the old equipment by hand.

Shortly before the scrutineering, I had to look for a way to the scrutineering box and whoops, I'm standing on the track of the Monza circuit, in a pit box full of beautiful GT3 cars:

Spoiler: Some GT3 Cars

As I was so stressed, I couldn't really enjoy the moment of getting on the track, but I did that later that day (see below).

After that, back to the pits. Now we had to search for the scrutineers who check the drivers equipment. And after running trough the whole paddock, I learned that he is already in our pit. Alright, next problem: Scrutineers have ZERO patience and of course, I had all the documentations with me. So running back to our drivers, just in time before the scrutineer left.

After that, it got more relaxed, were doing the trackwalk, which was very very cool and took a whole 1 1/2 hours:

Spoiler: Track walk

It was a very cool experience to go over the track and listen to two drivers who analyzed each corner and braking point. I think I also learned some things for project cars...


In between everything we had a mild shock when we saw that there have to be a lot of stickers on the car (sponsors, numbers, driver names) and some of them who were on the car are on the wrong place. So in between everything else we had to put all the stickers on the car (for which there are very strict rules):

Spoiler: Stickers

So at 11 pm, we were done at the track and as we heard, today was the most relaxed day of the weekend. Start tomorrow is on 7:30 am with the last meeting ending about 9 pm, which is not equal with ending the day.

I hope you got a short inside what it is like in professional motorsports, I will try to add a post each evening but I don't now when we will come back tomorrow. Tomorrow we have two free practice sessions and the qualifying. No one of our competitors (inside the KTM Cup) has ever driven with a GT4 car before (except one test day).

Sorry that this was a little short, but the day was rough and I really need some sleep before the day tomorrow
I will explain the whole concept next week when we are back home from our first race!

PS: Races will be streamed on http://gt4series.com
For more updates, follow us on facebook/twitter (I'm doing all the posts):
https://www.facebook.com/RYSTeamKtm/
https://twitter.com/RYSTeamKTM

If you have any wishes, what I should write about, just tell me:tup:

 

[lxmmy]

Good luck in the series, will definitely be cheering your team on.

 

[twitcher]

Great insight, thanks for taking the time. Looking forward to more updates. Best of luck in the race, and in the rest of the year!

 

[psychoazubi]

Thank for wishing luck, unfortunately it was not enough. But one thing after another:

Round 1 - Day 2:

We had a very early start at 7 am on the track. For us, it directly began in the media center, which is very nice in Monza, you can overwatch the whole pit like this: (This was actually the very first meters of our season:

Spoiler: First outing in FP1

https://web.facebook.com/RYSTeamKtm/videos

FP1 and FP2 went ok, our drivers got to learn the track and we finished both sessions on P20 (and 5th in class). They are both new to the track AND the car so we expected some improvement over the weekend. Infact, both drivers did improve more or less a whole second between FP1 and FP2. And we were the only team without any warning for speeding in the pitlane or not respecting track limits.

Meanwhile, our sister car lost the engine cover on it's first lap and after FP1 we had to change the fitting on our engine cover also to prevent that to happen.

After some problems with the data loggers it went on after FP2 until there was the first real shock of the day: We have to submit 8 tires that we want to use in the quali and both races. Alright, no problem we submitted that early until I heard that we got new tires. So, with 15 minutes until the deadline I was running from our pitbox to the race director, explain the situation, get a new sheet, get back to our car, note down all 8 barcodes of the tires and bring it back. Was a easy finish with submission 2 minutes before the deadline ends.

And from there on, we had some really bad luck (actually it started already before FP2). First with our GoPro. It HAS to run all the time you are on the track if there is some incident involving the car. Ours was quite old and the battery lasts almost exactly one hour. Which is a problem when you need to turn it on BEFORE going to the track. Which we missed. So I ran a few hundred meters behind the car to stop our driver and get the GoPro on. Which we also did exactly on time. So far so good.

Now it's getting interesting. As I am responsible for social media, I'm in the Media center during every session, as I have been during the Qualifying. Our Quali is divided into two parts: 15 Minutes Q1 - 10 Minute Break - 15 Minutes Q2 for driver 2.

Our first driver did improve about 0.6 seconds compared to his best FP2 lap until he had an accident with another car in the first chicane. There is no stewards decision about a penalty yet (the delayed it to Saturday) but we had a damaged cooler so that our second driver could not do one fast lap. So, starting from P20 tomorrow and last place on Sunday but our times are not looking that bad.

After the Qualifying, there was the next shock: "Team manager of #14 report to race director in the next 15 Minutes" So, first race and first time to report to the race director together with our driver because of the incident. Quite a nice experience, especially with our driving talking in dutch to the race director telling him what happened and only understanding half of what they said. It was actually the first ever crash of our driver in his gt career (he is only 19 years old).

So, we will (probably) get a penalty tomorrow morning but maybe we can escape the traffic in the first corner. It's the first race for everyone of our team except the mechanic. We have to change the driver during a mandatory pitstop, which is our main task to practice tomorrow morning.

After the Qualifying we analyzed GoPro Videos (they are property of the SRO so I am unfortunately not allowed to share it) together with all the data and a setup talk. That took a whole 3 hours and was actually the most exciting part of the weekend so far: Talking with our two drivers, a more experienced driver and our two engineers about changes on our car and the driving style. Actually I was able to copy my knowledge nearly 1:1 from sim racing to the real track, which is I think a great achievement for sim racing.

Of the three hours, 1 hour was to create a wet-session setup because the forecast says rain until the start of race 1 tomorrow. First race is at 13:50 CEST live on http://gt4series.com/live/

We've been 16 hours at the track today. Arrived at 7 am (which is bad because breakfast at our hotel starts at 7) and got home at 11 pm, just had a beer with another team and in between I've been writing this. Now going to bed, we are very excited about the race, I hope some of you guys will watch it! Don't forget, we are the black-orange KTM with #14

Sorry that there are no pictures today, it is just so late..If you want to see them just look at https://www.facebook.com/RYSTeamKtm/

 

[psychoazubi]

Round 1 - Day 3:

So, today was supposed to be more relaxed again. It wasn't. Another 14 hours at the track.

First thing at the track, we had to report to the stewards after the incident in the Qualifying. I went there with our driver Jamie who caused the crash and two representatives from Reiter Engineering. And when we entered the room they told me to handle that because I have to learn it. Oh well.. It felt like reporting to the school principle with him asking "Do you think you did anything wrong?" And just like in school, you HAVE to just apologies. This is a trick question. And our driver fell for it and didn't say sorry. So, start from P24 instead of P20 in the first race.

After some driver change practice and the drivers photoshoot it was already time for the Race.

And as our driver entered the car for the race everyone suddenly panicked because it started to rain. Much drama for no reason, it was only a short shower and stopped after some minutes. So on to the track!
I went to the Media center to follow the race on the screens and do some social media. Our first driver Jamie did very well on his first ever GT4 race and managed to overtake 11 cars in his stint! But the point is: In the Reiter Young Stars Cup, the drivers will be judged seperatly, so for a good measurement only the 5 fastest lap of each driver and race counts. But while overtaking 11 cars he only managed to do two fast laps which resulted in P8 out of 13 in the Reiter Young Stars Cup.
After handing over the wheel to Laura (while we lost 18 seconds in the pits because of a very slow drivers change), she really surprised us. After all this Data Analyzing and watching the GoPro videos she improved from 2:04,5 in the free practice to 2:01,6 in the race! With 4 other laptimes that fast we made some calculation and we found her to be either first or second in the class of best female drivers. At the End of the Season the beste male AND female driver get a seat in the Blancpain GT3 Series next year, so this class is also really important for us!

While getting nervous about the result I left the media center with 4 minutes to go (and safety car out) to find our cars. Few minutes later I was standing in the pits between two brand new Mercedes AMG GT3 watching the end of our race. I didn't even care to stand 2 meters between those beautiful cars because of our own race.

So we had another hour to wait for the result of our cup because they were really slow on calculating but here is the WINNER of the best female driver, our driver Laura Kraihamer!

Spoiler: And the winner is...

At the end of the race, we are actually gone from P24 to P11 even though we lost 18 seconds in the pit (which is better than another KTM which was 19 seconds below the minimum pit stop time. They didn't have a radio connection to the driver, so he ignored all penalties and flags and got DQ'ed after the race. During the end of the race they were in the battle for the lead because of that pit advantage).

So after the race is before the race. Which meant we started to analyze data again and then had a really interesting Pirelli Schooling were we learned so much about the tires we are using and what a change in pressure/camber/toe and so on does to the tires. That was really really helpful.

Then it was already 7 pm and we realized that the last time we ate something was at 8 am in the hotel after working the whole day.

After some lunch, our engineers went on to prepare the car for tomorrow's race (calculating fuel and such) I had to motivate our driver to practice pit stops. He really wanted to leave because he had not the best start into the season but it is really important that every move is just right. So even Hans Reiter (head of Reiter Engineering) and Naomi Schiff (test driver of Reiter for our GT4 car) helped us for more than an hour with our practice and we went on until 10 pm and it was really a hard task to keep our driver motivated.

Spoiler: Driver change practice

After that, our drivers went home to get some sleep and we went on discussing what to do with the car and strategy-wise for the next race tomorrow where we start last after we couldn't do a lap time in second Qualification...

Sometimes my Job as the Team Manager kind of feels like being a Kindergarden Teacher because the drivers always want to do what they WANT to do and not what they HAVE to do. Luckily, our two student engineers are working very well on their own.

Another hard day but again very very fun and interesting! Tomorrow I'll also be at the pit wall with the engineers so that will be another experience! I'll try to take some photos (no videos allowed on track or pit..) and share them.

So, one last night without any sleep, first meeting is in 8 hours at the track and I still have some work to do. I try to do a big post tomorrow on the drive home when I'm not behind the wheel with more pictures and stuff. And maybe a video of driver change practice.

And as always don't forget to watch our race 2 tomorrow. Start is at 11:15 CEST with the AM-drivers behind the most wheels (our drivers are not separated into Pro and Am, we can decide who starts which race by the qualifying line up -> Q1 driver starts Race 1 and same for Q2 and Race 2). First race was very exciting to watch with battles for the lead nearly the whole time!

For pictures from today look at our Facebook page and leave a like: https://www.facebook.com/RYSTeamKtm/

 

[psychoazubi]

Sorry for the delay, but after the race yesterday I've been driving home until 3 am this morning. So here it is:

Round 1 - Day 4:

The day of the final race has come. Only thing on the timetable was our race - which we unfortunately started in P26 after we couldn't really run Q2. In this race, I was also sitting at the pit wall behind the screens, noting down our drivers times, comparing them to our competitors and trying to overwatch everything that happened. We started with Laura behind the wheel and again, we quickly made up some places (after the safety car came in again after lap 2). Unfortunately we were hold up by #44 for a few laps and we couldn't get the fast laps we needed for the competition. In the middle of our 50 minutes race we went for the pitstop. After the pit stop time being a problem in race 1, we practiced a lot and the driver change itself was no problem. But look what happened when our second driver Jamie started to drive:




The hit didn't hurt either car but mentally, this is a bad start for sure. Luckily the race got very crazy at the end so that the race directors didn't notice our unsafe release and we did not receive a penalty!

After Jamie got into his rhythm it was already to late to really attack and quickly the safety car came back out. In the first lap after the safety car was back in the race was already finished - because of a red flag. This was caused by a BMW losing some oil and a few cars spinning because of that. After telling that to our driver we got the answer "I crashed at T10, I can't restart the car" (Luckily the restart of the car was the only problem - the chassis only had a few scratches).

Even though the race was finished for us by that we had one of the funniest moments of the weekend. The race director told everyone on track to driver directly to the parc fermé and that the red flag ends the race. This was just a few seconds after our driver spun out and so the answer from our engineer to our driver after telling us that he had an incident was "Ok Jamie, drive directly to the parc fermé now" He needed a few seconds to realize why we were all laughing

After 1-2 minutes he did manage to get the car working again and returned to the parc fermé. This incident didn't even matter because with a red flag, the race result is taken from the lap before, which was P19. We were not that happy about the overall result, but what counts for us the most is the Reiter Young Stars Cup. Here, we had a strong and a disappointing weekend. Jamie couldn't show his real speed in both races and landed on P8 twice which results in P10 in the overall standings.
Even though Laura was held up in race 2, she made P2, very close to P1. With P1 and P2 she is now tied for the lead in the overall female standings. The winner of both - male and female - will receive a seat in the GT3 Blancpain series 2017, so on that side we had a really really great start into the season.

After the race, we initially wanted to see the start of the GT3 Endurance race but as it happened, we were sitting in the engineers truck again analyzing the weekend and already preparing for the next race weekend which will take place from 13-15th May on the street circuit of Pau.

If you don't know the track, it is like the European Macau:



And as if the track itself wouldn't be enough we only have 60 minutes of free practice instead of 2 hours because there are five other racing series on this weekend (F3,F4, Clio Cup, Twingo Cup(!!) and Peugeot RCZ Cup). And as if that wouldn't also be enough, the first race will start at 8:50 PM into the darkness with 27 cars of which most drivers never been on this track.

After we finished our meeting, the weekend was over and we managed to get to the track to watch some GT3 racing. We just arrived in time at the straight before the last corner, because just after we were there a Ferrari lost his engine right in front of us. That looked quite spectacular.
After watching for some laps, we went home and it took 10 hours for 600km... After leaving Monza at 20°C in the Sun, we were suddenly in a snow shower in Swiss and Germany which was pretty crazy.

As an indicator of how much work you have for such a racing weekend, here are the things I saw of the town of Monza:
- Our hotel
- 1 Restaurant (after we arrived at 11pm on Wednesday)
- 1 Gas Station
- Racetrack

On Friday, we've been at the track for 16 hours, left because they closed and worked in the hotel for another two hours. That was a very very hard day for everybody.

Nonetheless it was super fun and I cannot wait for the next race in Pau.

I hope you enjoyed my posts and if you want, I will continue to do it at Pau.

For a lot of (professional pictures) and some videos (more to come in the next weeks) follow us on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/RYSTeamKtm/

 

[twitcher]

Thanks for taking the time to do these posts, I enjoy reading them. Looking forward to the next round 👍

 

[psychoazubi]

Thanks for taking the time to do these posts, I enjoy reading them. Looking forward to the next round 👍

Thanks, I think it was actually good to reflect what happened. Over the weekend it felt like that we had so many mistakes and bad luck, but in the end it looks much better. Only negative thing is that I couldn't follow what happened on track, expect for a few minutes of GT3 racing. But hey, that's a good price to pay for being involved in such a cool project

 

[Whodoyouthink]

Beautiful car, even more beautiful lady driver , and a beautiful program to get students in to motorsport. Reading that first post was like reading a bit of a dream!

 

[psychoazubi]

Beautiful car, even more beautiful lady driver , and a beautiful program to get students in to motorsport. Reading that first post was like reading a bit of a dream!

For me, that is indeed a dream coming true! I still can't believe that I'm now part of this. We even got a Fan Mail today!

I don't know where you're all living, but maybe there will be a race next to someone here