What a great weekend!!! From our best qualifying position of the year to leading the most laps during the race, we have definitely started moving in the right direction. This weekend I was again driving with Mike Forest in the number 13 Chevrolet Riley and unlike the 6 hour event at Watkins Glen we were running the short course which is the same as the long course except shortened by four corners.
Like most weekends for young teams, we struggled during the first session but we would have to get it sorted out quickly because unlike most weekends this weekend we would only have one practice session before qualifying. Dominic our engineer got the car working very well for Mike and I before qualifying. Our strategy for the weekend was for me to qualify and start the race while Mike would finish the race. Qualifying came and immediately we knew that we had a good car on the third lap of the session we had the car in p3 on the charts but by the end of the session we got shuffled back to 6th place and that is where it would finish up.
For the race starting on the outside of row number three was going to be tough to close the door on the cars with the inside line. When the race got underway I anticipated a quicker start so I started the race in second gear but the pole sitter started the race at a very slow pace so my gear selection proved to be too high and I should have started in first gear. I managed to get to the inside to defend my position but Nic Jonnson still managed to get by. When the first caution came out we were back in p6 and after all of the pit cycles and strategy calls we took the restart in second place behind the SunTrust car of Brian Frisselle and just in front of the eventual race winner Ricardo Zonta in the Krohn Racing Lola. After defending my position against Zonta for quite a while the race leader as well as Zonta decided to pit for fuel. Because of this strategy call we inherited the lead. We had an eight second gap over the second place car of Mark Wilkins (last years race winner) and 22 laps later we still maintained the lead and pulled the gap out to just over 11 seconds, but at this point we desperately need fuel and a driver change. We pitted with 40 minutes to go in the race, tires and a driver change occurred but an unfortunate problem with the refueling system prevented any fuel from actually going into the car. At the next restart we needed fuel and were forced to come to pit road forfeiting our position on track. By the end of the race the whole team still managed to pull off a 10th place finish. Everyone on the entire team did a great job preparing the car and I think people will be talking if Beyer Racing can continue with these strong performances and keep the momentum going.
