Rolex Sports Cars: The 2007 Mexico City 400km

[JohnBM01]

NOTE: The following text was relevant to Saturday, though I didn't post it on Saturday.

I normally don't cover the Rolex Sportscar Series. Let me just talk a bit about the Mexico City 400-kilometer race. I came home around 5:10 PM and turned on the tube to the Speed Channel. I had to really report this. Here are some Mexico City notes:

* no NASCAR crash fests and caution fests
* Pontiac and Gainsco get their first win in Mexico City
* Speedsource Mazda RX-8 picks up first win

--- 23rd Time's the Charm ---
As much as I hate Pontiac, I'd like to congratulate them on a great Daytona Prototype campaign in Mexico City. It took about 23 races for Gainsco to pick up their first win. They been in the series for something of three years. Think of all the different teams in different sports that had to wait for that big break to finally make some noise and win. Look at the Indianapolis Colts under Peyton Manning and Tony Dungy. Look at the Miami Heat under Dwayne Wade and Pat Riley. Teams have been in the game for some time and never had the chance to pick up that big win. I'm proud for Alex Gurney and company getting it done in Mexico's capital.

--- Zoom-Zoom ---
Nick Ham and Sylvain Tremblay picked up their first win for the Mazda RX-8. Whereas I haven't been much of a Daytona Prototype guy, the GT class is just fine. It used to be about a number of different classes of GT racing. The Mazda RX-8 is a very sophisticated 4-door sports car. In racing trim, it's a potent GT racer. Most people complained that there wasn't enough torque for the engine (even my brother said this). The thing no one can take away is that it's a Mazda. And how do Mazdas perform? Like Mazdas- like winners. Congratulations to Speedsource on this great win.


--- (Extra) Happy 36th Birthday, Leigh Diffey! ---
My favorite Speed Channel vocal talent are Bob Varsha, David Hobbs, and Leigh Diffey. Leigh Diffey can normally be heard calling down races in the Australian V8 Supercar series. I think he is a great commentator with a great voice and wonderful knowledge of racing. As I mentioned in the past, among my three favorite Speed on-air talent, the Australian is the youngest. Blow out the candles, Leigh! Have a great birthday.

 

[Jim Prower]

edited: post confusion....

 

[m.piedgros]

If I may be the Devil's Advocate, or at least play the role of the always awesome Robin Miller. The Busch race was a NASCAR-esc caution fest. The fact that in the last ten laps there were two (or was it three?) cautions, one for a spin in one that everyone got around safely and the second for what looked to be a metal bar of some sort on concrete somewhere is ridiculous. Last year at Watkins NASCAR used the "blue flag rule" which roughly translated is not the blue flag you and I are used to but played the role of the local caution. Why they can't just use a local caution is beyond me. NASCAR: If you are going to go road course racing, for all our sakes, use road course rules! How about JPM punting his teammate aside?! If I can go back to when JPM and Michael (Schumacher) were arch-rivals in F1 and remind you all in 2007 that Michael was called the rough driver what was JP? Don't get me wrong, after coming back to America I find myself starting to like JPM. However, I always have and always will like Scott Pruett more and what JPM did may very well have been a spur of the moment deal but the consensus was he had the superior car and something could have been sorted out to let him by. I think at 11am (or 12 if your in Carolina where these guys probably are - maybe Scott's back in Cali, who knows... but I digress) on Monday I am probably the only one still sore about that one.

As far as the Grand-Am race, a typically good affair. Grand-Am have managed to mix the amateurs and the people trying to get paid racing and managed to offend few and deeply offend fewer, and for that I give them kudos. I also like Grand-Am because of their ability to try new and different things and be willing to make mistakes and admit they were wrong always trying to give the fan a better product. The two and a half hour (400km) races were a downer for me at first but the coverage seems to be more complete than it was with the two and three quarter hour races of the past. Hopefully when the ALMS 2 & 3/4's come around they will devote three and a half hours to the broadcast in order to get the same kind of coverage we got with Grand-Am. Good on Alex Gurney and Jon Fogarty for winning DP and overall. It was also impressive to see those little Mazda's win GT.

Most painful moment of the weekend: A tie between Leighton (Reese) running his teammate over early in the Grand-Am race and how many times we were reminded by Dr. Jerry Punch and the ESPN staff that JPM is an international superstar and a Latino racing in Mexico.

Did you guys know that Juan Montoya is both an International Superstar AND was a Latino racing in Mexico this weekend?

m.piedgros

 

[Layla's Keeper]

Well, as a fan of the series, I'd like to say that it was actually a real barn-burner of a race. Papis and Gurney put on a whale of a show at the end, swapping the lead while using GT traffic for picks. It's a shame that Max lost it on the brakes over the bumps because I'm not sure that Alex had it in him to get around one more time.

Some other interesting notes out of Mexico......

- The first brand new Daytona Prototype chassis made its debut. Fabcar's next generation chassis rolled off under Cheever Racing colors (Cheever now being the distributor and factory team for Fabcar, supplanting Brumos). The car looked plenty racy and has tidied up the slab-sided 1st gen Fabcar significantly.

Previous generation Fabcar FDSC/03

New generation Fabcar

- midrace penalty for avoidable contact fails to prevent Suntrust from taking the podium's 3rd step, making it a podium sweep for both Pontiac engines and Riley chassis.

- Patrick Long/Mike Rockenfeller are the first non-Riley chassis, bringing the Alex Job Porsche Crawford home 5th. Next non-Riley is in 12, the sole Doran JE4 in the field. Doran Racing supposedly is shopping to sell their GARRA Constructor's License by season's end, unless sponsorship funding is found to develop a replacement for the JE4 - the 2nd oldest chassis in the field (the Fabcar being the oldest).

 

[JohnBM01]

Hey... I'm sorry! I had two posts lined up for two different threads. I'm sorry I brought this across! I will edit this immediately and post the other information in another thread. My apologies, everyone.