What happended to the DP Corvettes?
01-30-2012, 10:28 AM
#1
Pro
Thread Starter
What happended to the DP Corvettes?
I was watching the Rolex 24 off and on Saturday and Sunday (pretty boring really). I noticed the first Corvette went out around lap 14 and had engine problems, but I was not watching when the second (#99) went down 59 laps.
What was the final diagnosis of the two car problems?
George
What was the final diagnosis of the two car problems?
George
01-30-2012, 11:36 AM
#2
Tech Contributor
Member Since: Oct 1999
Location: Charlotte, NC (formerly Endicott, NY)
Posts: 40,085
Received 8,926 Likes
on
5,332 Posts
I was watching the Rolex 24 off and on Saturday and Sunday (pretty boring really). I noticed the first Corvette went out around lap 14 and had engine problems, but I was not watching when the second (#99) went down 59 laps.
What was the final diagnosis of the two car problems?
George
What was the final diagnosis of the two car problems?
George
Don't know what happened to the other three cars. They were at the front of the pack when I stopped watching Saturday night but at the time I started watching on Sunday the closest one was 14 laps down and I never found out why.
Bill
01-30-2012, 12:14 PM
#5
Race Director
It was a damn good showing for all 5 cars in their first race!!!
The #10 Suntrust car qualified 2nd, but had some kind of valve train problem they couldn't fix.
The #99 was doing great until they had a water pump and belt failure. I believe they had to remove the engine to get at the pump/belt for repairs, and that took about 2 hours. They still finished in 33rd overall.
The other 3 Corvette DP cars did really great!!! The #5 finished in 5th place, the #90 in 8th, and the #9 in 9th.
As far as boring - well, it's not a bump-and-bang NASCAR race. It's a looooong race and the idea is to keep the car going for 24 hours.
We had a great time walking around the pits and garages prior to the race, and the pre-race stuff on pit row let you talk to drivers and look at the cars and walk on the front straight of the track.
I had tickets for a dining event in the skyboxes above the Superstretch ( the back straight). After watching the start of the race from the FanZone in the infield, we went over to the Bud Party Porch that looks down onto the Bus Stop (the chicane before going back up onto the banking for NASCAR Turn 3), and multiple times every lap when a group of cars came roaring out of NASCAR Turn 2 onto the Superstretch jockeying for position for entry into the Bus Stop it was really exciting racing!!!
The dining in the skyboxes was from 6:00PM and we stayed watching the night action until about 10:45PM.
Every 10 or 20 seconds there would be a group of 3 to sometimes 8 or 10 cars coming into the brake zone for the Bus Stop at 170+ mph and braking to probably 90-100 for the entry into the chicane, and you could watch really great racing multiple times every minute of the night!!!
With the mixture of DP and GT cars of different speeds, every time more than one car came roaring up on the Bus Stop you could count on seeing some neat action. I watched a bunch of cars blow the turn-in (brake problems, missed downshift, traffic, or just going too deep before braking, etc.), and I saw a number of spins and other off-track excursions during the several hours I watched from up there.
Sorry you didn't get to see any good racing action, but I highly recommend coming and watching in person to get more of the overall race experience.
Bob
The #10 Suntrust car qualified 2nd, but had some kind of valve train problem they couldn't fix.
The #99 was doing great until they had a water pump and belt failure. I believe they had to remove the engine to get at the pump/belt for repairs, and that took about 2 hours. They still finished in 33rd overall.
The other 3 Corvette DP cars did really great!!! The #5 finished in 5th place, the #90 in 8th, and the #9 in 9th.
As far as boring - well, it's not a bump-and-bang NASCAR race. It's a looooong race and the idea is to keep the car going for 24 hours.
We had a great time walking around the pits and garages prior to the race, and the pre-race stuff on pit row let you talk to drivers and look at the cars and walk on the front straight of the track.
I had tickets for a dining event in the skyboxes above the Superstretch ( the back straight). After watching the start of the race from the FanZone in the infield, we went over to the Bud Party Porch that looks down onto the Bus Stop (the chicane before going back up onto the banking for NASCAR Turn 3), and multiple times every lap when a group of cars came roaring out of NASCAR Turn 2 onto the Superstretch jockeying for position for entry into the Bus Stop it was really exciting racing!!!
The dining in the skyboxes was from 6:00PM and we stayed watching the night action until about 10:45PM.
Every 10 or 20 seconds there would be a group of 3 to sometimes 8 or 10 cars coming into the brake zone for the Bus Stop at 170+ mph and braking to probably 90-100 for the entry into the chicane, and you could watch really great racing multiple times every minute of the night!!!
With the mixture of DP and GT cars of different speeds, every time more than one car came roaring up on the Bus Stop you could count on seeing some neat action. I watched a bunch of cars blow the turn-in (brake problems, missed downshift, traffic, or just going too deep before braking, etc.), and I saw a number of spins and other off-track excursions during the several hours I watched from up there.
Sorry you didn't get to see any good racing action, but I highly recommend coming and watching in person to get more of the overall race experience.
Bob