The Rolex 24 Hour race at Daytona
The Rolex 24 Hour race at Daytona in January 2007 finally arrived! After 3 months of planning and anticipation we were ready to go!
Many of the
participants rented motor homes and stocked them for the three day event. I had
skiff owners Bill Russell and Phil Jordan and my old Puppy Love rider Bill Baum
from Maryland signed up to be my riders.
Where do I start? I would say the month leading to the event was exciting, trying and full of up's and downs. There always seemed to be a stumbling block in the way as the date came closer. This event was sanctioned by the Classic Race Boat Association of which most of us down south have already joined. We will be putting on events up north it's just a matter of time.
We picked up our motor home Thursday evening so we had a jump Friday morning. Phil towed my boat River Rat to the track which made things easier. We were to meet the rest of the participants in the Home Depot parking lot to hand out credentials -no pass, no admittance. That went so smooth I originally set a time between 8am and 11 am but by 9:30 everyone was there. Were they excited or what? Dave Yeager was sent in at 8:30 to set up "Raceboat Central" alongside Lake Lloyd for the extra equipment and as a meeting place. We caravanned into the motor home spots as we were all camping together.
We entered the
track thru the 2nd turn tunnel, and once thru it was a new world. We
followed the "Trolley" road to the end of the lake where we were greeted by our
3rd guard gate. I think they were more excited than we were. It was
nerves and the unknown
that
had hold of me. I recently purchased the River Rat to do this event and only had
her out for a quick 40 mile shakedown cruise. I guess that was on my mind also.
Then again, the foot controls the situation, I guess.
Roger Harris and Doug Apy were in the water testing their limits. It wasn't long before a phone call came telling us to slow down; it wasn't our day to shine. I put my boat in the lake and carefully took a ride around the lake, and thank God there was nothing in my way because I don't recall looking at the water. The stands and people were overwhelming! I put my boat on the shoreline and my crew and I took a walk thru the crowd. We were celebrities to those who saw the boats, but remember they were there for an auto race.
Our
passes gained us access to wherever we wanted to go. It was great just being
waved thru like the racers and crews. We passed thru the general gate, the
inspection gate, walked thru the garage area than we were right up on the pit
wall where crews were jumping changing tires, fueling the racecars etc. I really
couldn’t believe the experience we were enjoying. My crewman Bill Baum was in
his glory because he's a NASCAR fanatic, and to be this close to all the action
at the greatest speedway had to be a real treat. When we reviewed the pictures
from the event, Bill Baum was all over the place. There is one picture where it
appears a mechanic is asking him for a wrench! Bill would have eagerly
obliged! (that's Bill in the red cap) We never asked can I get in there. We were
waved thru at every level of security. This experience itself was unbelievable.
Later that evening we made it back to the campers, out to dinner, then to sleep
by midnight.
Saturday morning came quick and we all headed down to the boats to get the demonstration course set, a meeting on what to do and what not to do, then we were off for a parade and some warm up laps.
We decided to run
single boat time laps for all the boats so you could get used to the course by
yourself. Afterwards we ran multi-boat demonstrations. I ran with 4 boats that
included Doc Forum, Dick Daly and Bill Fiekert. We ran 4 laps than moved over
for the next set of 3 boats till all 10 skiffs ran. We had 45 minute segments
and that just about did it. It was all I really wanted for a starter since we
would be doing that three more times that day, then again on Sunday.
The second set we
all agreed, we would go with the same group of boats but run more laps and a
little closer in the turns and a little faster in the straights. It went very
well. We had the right people in the groups so the faster boats could do their
thing. The second group was Roger Harris, Doug Apy and Doug Whichello. They were
matched very equally or at least made it look that way. The third group was Dave
Yeager, Paul Nowack
and Trevor Kirsch. Trevor and the boys were down from Jersey and Trevor was
tuning to run his boat caged this year. The course wasn't very friendly to the
fastest runners because it was tight turning, but for the slower boats it was
fine. The wakes coming back from the concrete wall made for very good skiff wave
jumping... I had a ball. I was so busy reading the water to avoid that stuff or
trip I was constantly telling my crew to watch the gages. I’ll tell you, it was
hold on as we navigated the surf.
Saturday evening it was out to dinner, back to cruising the pits and watching the fireworks then attempt to get some sleep. The Rolex race was on and 105 cars were racing and I don't have to tell you how loud it could get. Thank God there was a red flag caution long enough for all of us to fall asleep. We all slept like babies because we all were beat. One thing good about the noise of the racecars, you couldn't tell if anyone was snoring!
Sunday when we rolled out of bed at 7 am it was raining, man all I could think about was running in the rain. That wasn't a great idea so I just tried to ignore it. At 8:30 the phone rang and the Race Director said, "You guys are running at 9:00 am - get moving!" Why did he have my phone number? Fortunately, it had just stopped raining and the sun was peaking out.
Made my way to the boat and the crew was close behind. Our camp area was a good mile from the boat. The challenge was navigating thru the crowd of spectators, no one walked in the walking area. I thought it best to get the trailers early before the race was over and the people were starting to leave. Could be a real problem hooking someone with a fender because they weren't paying attention.
We had two slots
to fill on Sunday and after our morning meeting we decided to run the boats in
groups like we did on Saturday. The first group was minus Dick Daly who broke a
starter and that opened the door for Tom Wark to step up to the plate. It was
interesting watching Tom get his feet wet because we all ran Saturday. I think
Tom did get out Saturday, but he was running with us today. I had the
opportunity to take some of our members out who don't own skiffs and after the
ride, we have guys looking to purchase one. Speaking of purchasing one, the
River Rat was sold before the event so that was always on my mind. The agreement
was delivery after the event. Back on the water most of us were getting real
comfortable with the lake and just how our boats would react to the water
conditions. We were keeping 4 boats on the course at a time; one out one in, the
people loved it, so did we. We ran 4 laps per boat and it gave everyone a chance
to pair up with a couple boats for a good photo shoot. We ran our first 45
minutes in no time.
Our last 45 minute run ran into a full 90 minutes due to popular demand. Yes, we accommodated the request. We were beat by the end of our run. I ran out of fuel as I loaded on my waiting trailer, what a great event. The promoters of the event were pleased and I quote Robin's email:
"It
was a great show!!!
You and your Association should be very proud of the entire weekend. I know we
were proud to have you!
We certainly would like to have
you return. While our Speedweeks Lake Lloyd activities are set – we hope to
circle back with you all later in the year and talk about next steps.
Keep in touch and good luck in your season ahead!
Please pass along our appreciation to all the participants."
Robin Braig, President
Daytona International Speedway
We plan on returning to run more events at Lake Lloyd, and we want you to keep an eye on our parent association www.classicraceboatassoc.com for updated on some of our "OUTSIDE THE BOX" events planned for the future.
Till Georgefest 2/24/06
get in, sit down, shut up, and hang on.
Marty
