2008 Longest Day of Nelson Ledges 24 Hour Endurance Race
August 23-24, 2008 Nelson Ledges Race Course
“Extreme Crewing” The 2008 Motorsports LD Chronicle
By Andy Cotyk
3/31/09
Prologue: This past year’s 2008 running of the Longest Day
of Nelson Ledges 24 hour endurance race was a challenge of a sort not
previously experienced by the 5:01 team. I’ve chosen to chronicle this race in
a bit of a different manner this year, hour by hour as recalled from log
sheets, pictures, interviews after the race and my personal participation and
audio overview, from monitoring the radio as Team Manager throughout the event.
I hope you enjoy this account of our 2008 LD adventure.
10:00am Thursday August 21st, 5:01 Race Shop:
A number of team members are assembled at my house near Kalamazoo, Michigan including
Driver Lance Loughman, Crew Chief Cal Fullmer, Radioman Marc Henry, Fireman
Doug Start and Tire man Jerry Ulsh. It’s a beautiful summer August morning and
the day starts to heat up as the sun rises in the sky. We are set to depart for
the 300 mile tow to Nelson Ledges road course, after 8 weeks of hard
preparation following our unsuccessful run at the Summit Point, West Virginia
12 hour earlier last spring. 5:01 had gone through something of a renewal
process team-wise already last season, learning from a very disparaging
performance at Summit and working to focus on a much higher level of
organization which had culminated in a team “Summit” meeting where updated plans
for the LD race were presented to the group.
Sample from the 5:01 Team
strategy meeting, Powerpoint Presentation slides:
We travelled the remainder of the day and met other member’s
of the 5:01 team beginning to arrive at the track. Dinner and re-acquaintance
were the order of the night, as we settled in for the last of the weekend’s
“easy” hours.
2:00pm Friday August 22nd, Track
Practice Day : Lance reports over the radio during his
afternoon test day session run, that the engine has stumbled and quit in turn
13, and this is just as we had anticipated. We had begun the test day’s
activities with a measured amount of fuel in the tank and sought to see
precisely how many laps the car would achieve and how the engine would respond
as the vintage SU carbs sputtered from the now empty tank.
We had been back to the track from very early morning, the
20+ 5:01 crew members and 4 driver’s now working to setup the equipment and
facilities that would be necessary to participate in this most grueling racing event.
Sub-teams were assigned to all aspects of preparation for this event including
setup of the pit lane area, food services, car prep and on-track testing
support, fuel and tire service, and many other tasks necessary to support the
logistics of running this race. It was from my vantage point, an amazing thing
to see, these volunteer crew personnel busting butt in the hot August sun for
the team and the love of the sport.
7:38pm, Friday, Qualifying: Lance on lap 7 of his
evening qualifying run, posts an amazing 1:18.6 / 91.6mph average lap, to put
5:01 4th overall on the starting grid for the 2008 running of the 24
Hours of Nelson Ledges!
Qualifying Results
We would take turns during that evening’s qualifying
sessions, practicing driver changes and gathering more track practice time
before the next day’s upcoming race. Steve Kramer took to the wheel following
Lance and posted nearly an exact lap time, further cementing the capability of
the machine and driver’s to post fast laps. Driver Audrey Zavodsky would close
out the qualifying runtime at 8:37pm allowing the crew to prepare the car for
night practice.
Photo by Car and Driver “Wicked Fast Z”
2:10am Saturday August 23rd, Motel 6: I
wake up and wander outside in the solitary night time to a brilliant full moon
sky on this summer night’s eve of the big race. My back hurts abit and I’m
feeling about as tense as any Team Owner before such a race, and I happen to
look across from our motel and see a “4-Season’s Health Spa” with a red neon sign
that says “Open 24 Hours”. What luck.
So I trundled over to the Health Center hoping that I might
be able to get something to help calm me down abit, and was quite surprised to
note the all-girl staff of health professionals at this facility.
I was disappointed to find out though, that they did not
accept my Blue-Cross/Blue Shield insurance card and I also noted that their fee
schedules seemed pretty exorbitant, so I decided to just head back to the motel
and get some more sleep before waking to the race day activities.
8:00am, Saturday, Race day Morning: The team
has been working for quite awhile already this morning. We had discovered a
radiator leak and were installing the spare while one team member was off to
find a radiator shop to solder up our primary unit.
There was a flurry of activity as the crew worked to prepare
for the noon race start, different this year than the previous year’s 3:00pm old start time. It is a brilliant sunlit summer day and pleasantly warm and perfect
for the challenge to begin. There was no hint of rain for the balance of the
weekend in promise of fantastic event weather.
Still early in the morning, myself and Crew Chief Cal
address the entire team for our traditional pre-race meeting, outlining team
member assignments and logistics, safety items, and this year’s race dedication
to my good friend Mike Crawley. All the preparations that have been made to get
to this point, are about to come into play, and we close the meeting with a
scant 3 hours remaining to the start of the big race.
Photo by Tom Crafts
11:58am Saturday, Race Start!: Audrey is belted in
the car, engine fired, in our 4th place grid position as
the grid workers hold up two fingers signaling the 2 minute warning to roll
out. Excitement fills the air as the race machines begin 2 pace laps followed
by the waving of the green flag, as literally hundreds stand in anticipation of
the early lapping frenzy that leads into this very long race. The clock is
running and time now matters greatly.
An accomplished and skillful driver, Audrey leapt to 3rd
place overall just ahead of Car and Driver’s Tony Swan and proceeded to show
the field the capabilities of the 38 year old chassis that we still choose to
brandish in this wheeled battle. On her sixth lap in, she posted a near qualifying
speed lap and went on to lead the team to first in class and 2nd
overall, in the early hours of the race.
7:52pm Saturday, Car 51- Lap 51: I’m working
lap 51 of my first driver’s stint, and have just passed a slower car in the chute
between turns one and two. The car is running fantastically and but for an
early unexplained front brake pad change after 282 laps, we’re 2nd
in class and 4th overall in the 7th hour of the race.
Steve and Lance have both driven flawless, near 100 lap stints, prior to my
run.
As I setup for the Oaktree high speed left sweeper, the back
end of the car begins a very long and gentle spin ending up trackside left in
the grass. I put the car in 1st gear and pull forward abit, but find
that there is a scraping noise and that it was not driver error or a slippery
track that has caused the spin. I get out of the car to find the left rear
wheel gone and radio to the crew that we’re about to need their expertise.
Photo by Car and Driver “5:01 Drove the wheels off”
9:10pm Saturday, Tech Shed: The crew is now just
past one hour’s work time on the car and has replaced the entire left rear
suspension and is working on reconstructing the exhaust which was damaged as it
ground into the track. The left rear stub axle retaining nut thread had
fractured allowing it to exit the hub when the left turn had pulled it in the
correct direction. The team is functioning well together as a result of our
group organizational meetings, and the downtime given the magnitude of the failure,
will be minimized.
The corner worker’s found our wheel in turn 9, having jumped
the tire wall and rolled about a football field’s distance away from the
separation point. A recalcitrant brake master cylinder will need replaced
before resuming, having gone flat during brake re-bleeding for some reason.
9:15pm Saturday, Driver’s Headquarters: I knock on
the door of the “Driver’s Central” motor home and enter to find Audrey working
to tape-on, wrap and otherwise surround her legs, and torso with whatever
padding and foam rubber and tape she could find. Her first stint had been
particularly brutal with respect to bouncing around in the cockpit, and she now
took on the appearance of a pro-linebacker, in preparation for the next physically
demanding session. She exited the quarters stiffly, heading to the tech shed,
and then climbed back into the now repaired 5:01 machine and steered back to
the track amidst crew and crowd cheers at 9:42pm. This after a mere 1 hour and
38 minute major suspension change-out. I retire to sleep abit on one of the
race parts trailer’s, listening to Marc Henry’s comic routines, on the pit to
car radio.
5:01am Sunday August 24th, 5:01 Paddock: I awake abruptly in the pre-dawn light to hear Lance call out “Heavy
Contact!!!!”, across the 5:01 pit radio. Working lap 69 of his night time
session, Roland Hahn Racing’s Spirit of Nelson #64 car had gone off track side
left in turn 3 and abruptly snapped back across track as their driver steered too
sharply onto the pavement, T-boning the 5:01 240z’s entire left side.
Photo by Tom Crafts
There had been nothing Lance could do, as he pitted to have
the fender pulled clear of the left front tire, and the balance of the car
checked for any critical damage. He continued after a 10 minute pit stop frenzy
of hammers and racer’s tape and expletive’s deleted, to continue his otherwise 2nd
best team economy run that would total 100 laps from the 22 gallon tank.
5:50am Sunday, Pit stop #12: Lance pulls in as
daylight has now ascended, having had a reasonably rough night-to-day
transitional stint. The crew works feverishly to pry the driver’s door open as
the door latch mechanism has now become inoperative due to the T-bone hit. And
the alert crew finds that the stock control arm bushings on the left rear
suspension that was replaced, are destroyed having not stood up to the pounding
from the rough Nelson track, and will have to be replaced.
I cannot say enough about the heart and soul of this 5:01 team, as they hoist the car up and work to repair the suspension once again. In
parallel they devise a wire-pull system for the driver’s door, to allow for
driver exit should it become necessary, and the fuel and tire guys execute
their strategies to make sure that the necessary services are performed before
I go back on track. I re-enter the race with approximately 5 hours to go, and
the car feels fantastic in the early morning hours.
10:50am Sunday, Final Driver Change: As the team fuels
the car, installs a new set of front brake pads, and adds water to the driver’s
drink bottle, Steve climbs into the car and then blasts back into the race for the
final hour or so of the event. He has never driven the last segment of a 24
hour race at Nelson, and is by the sound of the exchanges on the radio, having a
great time in the final minutes of the race. He has driven fantastically in
this running of the LD, completing the most laps of all of us driver’s and
posting a very consistent performance at the wheel. (There was however some
sort of Black Flag, Stop-n-Go penalty during his last drive that I had never
heard about. I only found it now while reading our team T&S log sheets!!)
With 26 minutes to go to the finish, the 5:01 team calls Steve in, and performs our last pit stop to wire up the heavily damaged exhaust system
one more time. Steve crosses the finish line at the high noon, 24 hour race completion
mark, and the massive crew & spectator crowd cheers as the double checkered
flags wave in the beautiful summer sunshine!
Final Results and Race Info:
As titled above this was the most difficult 24 Hour of
Nelson Ledges race ever competed by the 5:01 Team. We posted an 11th
overall and 3rd in ITS finish, from the hard work and determination
of all of the 5:01 crew.
(Final Results - Reprinted from Mylaps.com)
The list of problems that the Team had overcome was lengthy,
much of which stemmed from the stub axle failure. We had made 16 pit stops
during the race, which was not quite the way to win such an event, but
noteworthy in that each time there was trouble, the crew gave us back the car!
A performance for which, they should be very proud.
Photo by Tom Crafts
Race Pit Stop Data
So too did the driver’s perform to their best! We lead in
class for most of the first 7 hours, and were showing well against the competition
with respect to lap times, fuel mileage, and time between stops. As is always
the case in endurance racing, mechanical reliability was the ultimate decider!
A special thanks is due also, to Jeff Speer and Bruce Foss
at Hoosier Tire, for their continued and much appreciated support.
Photo by Tom Crafts
Hour by Hour Race Summary
It’s early spring now at the 5:01 Motorsports race shop, and
through the winter we have been busy preparing the venerable 240z for whatever
this year’s economically challenged times will allow for the LD event.
Photo by Andy Cotyk
Most recently we have heard that the 2009 race may be
reduced to a 12 hour event, for which regardless of this year’s race duration,
I plan to gather the fantastic 5:01 Team and return to do battle!
Photo by Brain Culbertson
See you all soon!
Andy
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