Western Endurance Racing Championship at Miller Motorsports Park part 2
I arrived back in the pits to find… The Mustang, in one piece and not on fire. As it turns out “blew up” means different things to different people. Unfortunately the clutch gave out, which ended the day for Travis, Todd, Dave and Jason. It was a melancholy scene, but the hour and a half they were out there wasn’t so bad. They’re night was done, but for others the evening was about to begin.
Racing is a physical effort, which is why the drivers do their best to stay in some semblance of shape. Some take it a bit more serious than others… Seeing a man do lunges and jog across three pit stalls is a sight I don’t think I will ever forget. As he was preparing his body and mind for the stint ahead, RaceCo was bringing their guy in for a driver change and fuel stop.
Intense doesn’t even begin to describe the atmosphere during an endurance race pit stop. There are a lot of moving parts and, while longer than pit stops in other motor sports, time is a huge factor. Those extra seconds add up, and turn in to minutes, which over the course of a six hour race could become tens of minutes. Cole Powelson, driver and chief push broom technician at RaceCo, hopped out and declared himself #1 after relaying some information about the car. He had a couple of minutes to relax and change before it got windy again…
Wind can be handled, but the dust and lack of visibility could cause havoc. Seeing from Clubhouse to Release was almost impossible, even if you were standing in between the turns. Mercifully the winds died down and visibility picked back up. I gathered my things, hopped in my car and made my way to Black Rock, the first in a series of hairpin turns on the west section of the track.
The turn sits at the end of a high speed section, so naturally this is where the brakes would see the most use. Everyone was lighting up their brake rotors, especially the vehicles that carried buckets of speed in to the turn. The Factory Five GTM and the Radical had absolutely no problem cooking their brakes coming in to the turn, lap after lap after lap.
With the sunset painting the sky with hues of orange, blue, purple and magenta, the on track action almost seemed like an added bonus. There was barely enough light in the sky to illuminate the racers, and when that faded we all had to resort to artificial means of light.
The cars would cast eery slivers of light on to the track, illuminating only what was in their immediate path. Their tail lights were the eyes of shifty demons scurrying about the track, looking for a victim to terrorize. It was quite a sight to behold, and a rather difficult one to capture. Unable to capture thin windows of light, I did something that seemed like a good idea: setting the camera on a tripod and capturing the trails of light the cars were leaving behind.
Most everyone had bright, white lights. Everyone, except the Radical. It had a white LED light bar on the roll hoop, but red orange lights on the front of the car. The track took on a sinister glow when it passed. It left a devilish red-orange trail with a little white halo above it. It was also hitting the curbing, which can be seen by the ripples on the left side of the picture. Most everyone else played it safe and only touched the curbing while taking as straight a path through the Attitudes as they could.
I don’t like saying it, but the grand stands on the race weekends I have been in attendance have been rather empty. This night was no exception. One of the best spots to watch a race from are the stands on the outside of Release, the track’s final turn before the straight. From those seats one can see cars coming through Witchcraft and disappear as the cross the Attitudes. They reappear just past the clubhouse, and you can see them all the way until they dip out of sight as they travel through turn 1.
I returned to the pits, and made my way through lifeless GP garages to a dark and busy pit lane. Privateers and factory backed crews toiled under the work lights to ready their cars for another stint. By this time everyone was preparing for their last outing on the track for the night. The drivers were exhausted, the crews were fatigued but still they fought on.
The end was in sight for those still driving. Last minute information was relayed to drivers, fuel was topped off, lights were cleaned and finally the engines were fired. Off in to the blackness one more time…
Words and photos by Michael Chandler
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