Tag: Le Mans

  • Suzuki Podium Is Much-Needed Leverage in Factory Fight for Vinales

    Suzuki Podium Is Much-Needed Leverage in Factory Fight for Vinales

    Blue track suits dominated the podium at Le Mans on Sunday, but a lighter shade than usual was present in the form of Team Suzuki Ecstar’s Maverick Vinales. His first premier class podium, a possible instance of foreshadowing showed the 21-year-old next to the dark blue suits of the Movistar Yamaha team where he may end up next season.

    Suzuki’s first podium since 2008 and a career benchmark for the second year rider, he downplayed the implications of his high finish as it relates to his upcoming decision to remain at Suzuki or take an offer from Yamaha.

    “The decision is gonna be really difficult but every day is more clear and finally as soon as possible I will make it,” said Vinales. “For sure, I will make the decision soon. I don’t need to think [the decision] is whether I made a podium or not.”

    If Vinales has already settled on Yamaha and is just waiting to make it official, then the podium won’t have much effect, but if he is still considering Suzuki then it would be difficult to imagine the factory’s best finish in nearly a decade won’t provide some pull in attaining the Spaniard.

    Team Suzuki Ecstar knows this well, and in an interview with Motorsport.com, Suzuki boss Davide Brivio made it clear that improvements set for early in the season could help keep Vinales on board.

    “That task began last summer when we explained our development programme for the bike,” Brivio said. “We knew that in the first three or four races 2016, Maverick would decide his future, so we had to take a step forward, and we have done that.”

    Brivio said Vinales will choose teams sometime between Le Mans and Mugello because Yamaha does not want to wait too long.

    An Improving Team in 2016

    With just five races to make an impact this season, Suzuki has done just that.

    Vinales and teammate Aleix Espargaro have finished inside the top six the last three races in a row. Currently fifth in the World Standings, Vinales only finished worse than sixth place at Argentina, where he crashed. Espargaro’s worst finish this year is 11th, and he sits seventh in the standings.

    Vinales has already gathered over half of his total points from last year less than a third of the way through this season (49 points through five of 18 races), which is more a comment on this season’s huge success than any failure last season. In his 97-point rookie year in the premier class, he gathered points in every race except Brno and Motegi, both of which ended in crashes.

    Last year at Le Mans, Espargaro failed to finish and Vinales came in the ninth spot. Improvements this year are undoubtedly due in big part to rider performance, but it goes without saying that Suzuki is providing better bikes. Vinales and Espargaro combined have finished every race this year but one. Among those nine races completed, they average a finishing position of 6.2.

    Is It Enough To Keep Vinales Around?

    Vinales voiced concern over his inability to maintain pace with the leaders during qualifying at Le Mans, claiming that rear tire sliding caused him to fall nearly a second off Jorge Lorenzo’s pole time.

    “For me it’s always the same problem. I always say, also last year, that we need to improve the rear,” Vinales said. “The problem is, when I need to use the rear to turn, the bike doesn’t turn and it starts to slide. It’s one year that I say the same and I still have the same problem.”

    The Suzuki optimist could see Vinales’ concern as a sign that he is invested in the team and wants better performance going forward. More likely, his interest in Suzuki’s performance pertains to the remainder of the season ahead. With an offer from the top team in the world dangling in front of him and the bad taste of recent dissatisfaction with Suzuki performance in his mouth, several signs point to a move. It doesn’t help Suzuki’s chances that Vinales’ third spot on the podium was bested only by the two riders from the team that is trying to sign him.

    Brivio thinks an underdog Suzuki narrative could provide leverage against Yamaha in the fight for Vinales.

    “Maverick can become a legend if he wins with Suzuki, because at Yamaha everybody expects him to do it,” Brivio said. “In any case, that is up to him, and maybe he doesn’t care at all. Maybe he only wants to win and that’s it.”

    Vinales must decide which team offers the best residence to fulfill expectations regarding his being the next big thing. Yamaha has the track record. But Suzuki is making reasonable arguments, which is keeping things interesting.

    “If he stays at Suzuki and we win, the story will be very inspiring because we started from scratch together,” Brivio said. “He arrived at Suzuki new to MotoGP, and we were also new as a team. From a sporting point of view it would be very inspiring.”

    Vinales has a lot to think about: The future of his career. The future of the sport. The potentially history making intersection of those separate-but-bound unwritten narratives.

    The French GP could only have made his decision more difficult. With a contract offer from the reigning champions, he just made recent history with an underdog team that is very much on the rise. Just how high that team can rise is the question he must answer.

  • The Final Word – Junior wins at Daytona as Dillon scares the hell out of us all

    The Final Word – Junior wins at Daytona as Dillon scares the hell out of us all

    “That scared the hell out of me.”

    With those post-race words, race winner Dale Earnhardt Jr. summarized exactly how every fan felt as they watched the end of the Sunday night/Monday morning race at Daytona. That track. That team. That car number. That wreck as they came to the line was scary and, until we saw those upraised thumbs of all those crewmen who had raced onto the track to lend assistance, we all feared what we may have just witnessed.

    It took three hours to outlast the rain, but it was worth every moment, from a fan’s perspective. The action was incredible as those 3400-pound machines thundered around in close formation at more than three times highway speeds. We had wrecks, including one that caused Aric Almirola to tumble out of a Chase place, allowing Clint Bowyer to slide in. We saw Kyle Busch scrape the wall, lose a couple of laps, yet dig down to finish 17th. In his bid to move up into the Top Thirty on the season, so his win at Sonoma might count for a pass to contend for the title, he only made up eight of the 136 point gap, with just nine events to go before the Chase spots are finalized.

    We watched to see if we would have a repeat winner or if a new victor might take it to complicate someone’s race to the Chase. We soon discovered that Junior had come home, as he demonstrated all his superspeedway talent to drive at 200 mph while watching his mirrors and blocking the lines that moved up to challenge him. It marked his second of the season and 25th of his Cup career. Then all hell broke loose.

    As they hit the line, Kevin Harvick touched the left rear of Denny Hamlin. It was enough to allow Jimmie Johnson to claim second as Hamlin’s car whipped around counter-clockwise and speared the following No. 3 Chevy of Austin Dillon. Combining the angle of the hit, the speed of the cars, and aerodynamics, Dillon’s car launched from the inside lane over the next two for a terrifying impact above the wall, directly into the catchfence.

    Two posts snapped, the catchfence disappeared, but the cables held it all together long enough to abruptly stop the car’s momentum and return it, in pieces, back to the track. Dillon’s engine bounced unattached into the grass on the infield, as what was left of the shattered chassis spun back on the track upside down, with no nose, no back end, and just three tires. Then Brad Keselowski slid hard into it to make beating hearts beat that much faster.

    Crews, led by Earnhardt’s, rushed on to the track to lend immediate assistance, beating all emergency personnel to the scene. They bent down to check into the cockpit. Agonizing seconds later, they stood, thumbs raised up to indicate our worst fears were not to be realized on this day. Three fans were injured, one taken to hospital in stable condition. Considering that the car hit the fence wheels first and stayed out is almost a miracle.

    If only all races promised this kind of action. There are those who dwell on the dangers, and I must admit that my first automatic response would be to tell them to “go to hell.” If you pay to go, if you pay to sit anywhere near the fence, if you sit anywhere anything can be flung from a crashing car to reach where you sit, you better realize there is inherent danger just being there. Maybe as much as that flight to Orlando, or the car trip to Daytona Beach. But…

    As one driver noted, what if two cars get launched? What if they arrive a split second apart? What is there is no longer a viable catchfence left to catch that second car? NASCAR, in fact, no form of motorsport, needs another Le Mans tragedy, which claimed the life of a driver, 83 spectators, and injured 120 more in a 1955 inferno.

    There is a reason you do not see seats right up to the fence. Still, if you can see through the fence, some car parts can make it through to you. I think fans know this, understand this, but all that knowledge and understanding goes out the window should tragedy strike. All they can do is try to reduce the risk,

    Daytona, this past weekend, proved to be damned exciting, as exciting as it gets, but it comes with risk, and it is shared by drivers, teams, and fans alike. A risk that can be reduced, but never totally eliminated. Everybody needs to know that.

  • Five Questions With Colin Braun

    Five Questions With Colin Braun

    For my next interview, I had had the honor to talk with Colin Braun. He is currently driving for the Core Autosport American Le Mans Series team. He formerly drove in the Camping World Truck Series and the Nationwide Series. Here is my interview with him.

    Q: Imagine yourself not as a driver but as a race fan, if you were to do a ride along with any driver, other than yourself, who would you chose, which track and why?

    Colin Braun: Whew – that is hard to imagine. I suppose I would like to ride along in a Formula 1 car at Monaco. But then again us race drivers aren’t good at not being in control…

    Q: If you could have a track named after you, what kind of track would it be and where would it be located?

    Colin Braun: It would have to be a fast, road course named after me. I love fast sweeping corners so that’s what my track would be about. I would probably have it in Texas since that’s where I’m from.

    Q: What is your most memorable race?

    Colin Braun: Well as of recent the race in Laguna Seca in the LMPC ALMS Core Autorsport car – it was just a great race and really nice victory!

    Q: Who would you consider to be NASCAR’s bad boy? Golden boy?

    Colin Braun: This is to tough of a question to answer… I take the 5th!

    Q: What advice would you give someone who wanted to be a race car driver?

    Colin Braun: Always work hard and never give up! You can achieve anything you set your mind on… Keep at it!