What a track… set in a beautiful ski resort mountain village in French speaking north east Canada. Mont Tremblant is a technical and very fast 2.65 mile road course with 15 turns and steep grade changes. We came here optimistic and energized! Over the first three races in 2004 we have been fine tuning the performance of our cars, and perfecting our skills as a team. All of the previous races have been Rovals (Converted oval tracks into road courses), this race was on a dedicated road course and that’s what the NSX is suited for.
Thursdays practice went as expected, both cars and drivers made consistent progression on this new track. I mentioned that Mont Tremblant was a fast track… 5 of the 15 turns reach speeds over 100 MPH, many tracks have 1 or 2 high speed turns but this course featured a third, in a range that would be impossible to have adequate runoff for protecting the car and driver. She is also known to have an appetite for eating cars. During the first day we witnessed many incidents including a roll over and a few total losses (Vehicle not driver
One of those loses was a sweet looking new GT Ferrari.
Fridays practice almost included us in the statistics. One of our drivers dropped a wheel in turn 1, a super fast off camber high speed turn. The car slid down the hill hundreds of feet in the slippery grass, just missing the gravel trap by inches as if the track didn’t allow mercy. The car hit the tire barrier straight on, fortunately the damage was repairable with the creativity of our crew… and a neighbor teams hydraulic push press. She gave us a warning that reminded us every time we got a high speed glimpse of the long signature in the grass.
Even after our better then average amount of practice and finally racing a dedicated road course, our lap times were not competitive with the upper cars in our class. Both of our team drivers had very similar times and have proven driving ability. These results were discouraging, so we discussed a plan to see if the series would allow us to have a G-A veteran professional driver test our car in the final practice before qualifying on Saturday. This plan is an attempt to prove our ability and emphasize the ability of our car. This could accelerate our request for part concessions to make our entry more even with the rest of the series. Every car except the NSX has major concessions to make them competitive… and beyond! In real world production form the NSX would share the honor of winning the fastest lap times with only one other car competing in our series. Our choice of drivers was a paid Pro driving for the GT NSX of Honda American Racing Team, Pete Halsmer was delighted to help our efforts and even “enthusiastic to contribute with our young energetic team”. His times were better, but not far off our eventual best. We can equate his better time to having much more experience on this track and maybe he’s a little better driver… he does have more experience there too. Pete added that the car was well balanced and we had a good handle on it’s tuning. His best time would have only qualified him in 21st place, this should help our cause with the series officials.
Qualifying went well we dropped even more time with the fresh tires and mental advantage of knowing someone else had gone faster in the same car.
The race- After 10 laps we developed a fatal overheating problem, were only guessing was caused by a leaking head gasket. Our cooling water was getting consumed by the engine until we didn’t have enough to cool the engine. We packed up and headed home… not discouraged, and already working towards Watkins Glen. “What doesn’t kill you will make you stronger”
32 cars entered in our class at Mont Tremblant and only 18 crossed the finish… she was full-
DAL Motorsports would like to thank our major sponsors: Goodson Acura, Valvoline, American Honda, and Exedy Clutches- Without them we would not be able to compete.
Thursdays practice went as expected, both cars and drivers made consistent progression on this new track. I mentioned that Mont Tremblant was a fast track… 5 of the 15 turns reach speeds over 100 MPH, many tracks have 1 or 2 high speed turns but this course featured a third, in a range that would be impossible to have adequate runoff for protecting the car and driver. She is also known to have an appetite for eating cars. During the first day we witnessed many incidents including a roll over and a few total losses (Vehicle not driver
One of those loses was a sweet looking new GT Ferrari. Fridays practice almost included us in the statistics. One of our drivers dropped a wheel in turn 1, a super fast off camber high speed turn. The car slid down the hill hundreds of feet in the slippery grass, just missing the gravel trap by inches as if the track didn’t allow mercy. The car hit the tire barrier straight on, fortunately the damage was repairable with the creativity of our crew… and a neighbor teams hydraulic push press. She gave us a warning that reminded us every time we got a high speed glimpse of the long signature in the grass.
Even after our better then average amount of practice and finally racing a dedicated road course, our lap times were not competitive with the upper cars in our class. Both of our team drivers had very similar times and have proven driving ability. These results were discouraging, so we discussed a plan to see if the series would allow us to have a G-A veteran professional driver test our car in the final practice before qualifying on Saturday. This plan is an attempt to prove our ability and emphasize the ability of our car. This could accelerate our request for part concessions to make our entry more even with the rest of the series. Every car except the NSX has major concessions to make them competitive… and beyond! In real world production form the NSX would share the honor of winning the fastest lap times with only one other car competing in our series. Our choice of drivers was a paid Pro driving for the GT NSX of Honda American Racing Team, Pete Halsmer was delighted to help our efforts and even “enthusiastic to contribute with our young energetic team”. His times were better, but not far off our eventual best. We can equate his better time to having much more experience on this track and maybe he’s a little better driver
… he does have more experience there too. Pete added that the car was well balanced and we had a good handle on it’s tuning. His best time would have only qualified him in 21st place, this should help our cause with the series officials. Qualifying went well we dropped even more time with the fresh tires and mental advantage of knowing someone else had gone faster in the same car.
The race- After 10 laps we developed a fatal overheating problem, were only guessing was caused by a leaking head gasket. Our cooling water was getting consumed by the engine until we didn’t have enough to cool the engine. We packed up and headed home… not discouraged, and already working towards Watkins Glen. “What doesn’t kill you will make you stronger”
32 cars entered in our class at Mont Tremblant and only 18 crossed the finish… she was full-
DAL Motorsports would like to thank our major sponsors: Goodson Acura, Valvoline, American Honda, and Exedy Clutches- Without them we would not be able to compete.
- Man i am slipping. SPEED usually shows the Grand Am race the next week or 2 weeks later. Oh well, must set TIVO for June 27th wknd.
