ALMS, Long Beach – Warm Up Report
Early Start Gary?
© Gary Horrocks

Yep, the clouds are here. All day long? Maybe, we’ll see.

And so the almost 12 hours of Long Beach starts. In order to get inside the track parking, we got to the track at 6:30am and likely won’t be out until 7:00pm or even later – thus starts another long race day, all for what is effectively 115 minutes of track action.

First off, something that was missed from yesterday. Tomy Drissi had a big moment in the Speed GT session late yesterday and was taken to the hospital. The hit was hard and it appears as if he is out for the race. Chris McMurry was in the Autocon car for warm up. Confirmed – Drissi is out and McMurry is in. The car will start from the back of the grid. Drissi has a broken vertebra and will be in a back brace for up to six weeks.

Also starting from the back will be the #40 Doran built Ford GT. Reason is one of the drivers did not meet minimum qualifying times.

Early in the 15 minutes session this morning, the Highcroft Acura (Sharp) got into the back of the Mazda (Bonilla), causing a short red and minor damage to the back of the Mazda and likely some damage to the nose of the Acura. Surprisingly, Bonilla bounced back and led the session overall for a good portion of the time.

Intersport was suffering through what appears to be brake issues in the warm-up. It was later found that the issues were related to the front diffuser coming loose. This comes after having gearbox issues on Thursday that limited them to effectively 1 lap.

The cooler conditions, coupled with a track that was rudely awaken quite early in the day, led to slick conditions on track. And that fed into the hands of Audi, who late (well to be honest, late in a 15 minute session can’t really be considered late can it?) turned the fastest laps in the session, with Marco Werner setting the fastest time. This is Frank Biela.

Back at the circuit was Adrian Fernandez, after traveling back and forth to Mexico City and he showed that he was ready to go, getting in the 3rd best time overall, best in P2.

Among those that decided to sleep in or not go out for whatever reason were both of the Corvettes, the Corsa Ferrari, both Risi Ferraris, and both Dyson Porsches. So what was Marino doing then?

Joel Feinberg confirmed that the Viper they are racing this weekend is not up to the level of the car that wrecked at St Pete. “There just was not adequate time between the races to bring this chassis up to our current specification. But we’re committed to racing here and will do everything that we can to make the show. We hope to be able to incorporate all of the up-grades again soon.” It was confirmed that they are still running on a club spec Michelin tire and will be swapping away from those soon. Nothing was mentioned as far as the type of replacement tires, but a swap will occur soon. He is in this for the long run and is formulating plans for the future, which may include prototypes.

Oh, before we forget here, the always interesting and charming Chuck Dressing reminded us that yesterday was the 37th anniversary of the first IMSA race. April 18th, 1971, won by Peter Gregg and Hurley Haywood, in a Brumos Porsche 914/6. Ol' Martin Spetz even found the program cover for that event on the world wide web..

Now, it’s time to go find a quiet place, and curl up for a nap…