I had refrained from posting this news until I knew for sure, but I am heading off tomorrow to drive in the Long Beach Grand Prix weekend!!  It's very exciting news and will be my biggest race to date.  I will be running the #07 Aston Martin DBRS9 in the World Challenge GT class, which races immediately after the Indycar race (WC race is Sunday at 5pm).  It will be a bit different to the 150hp Mazda Miata I raced last season!!  This will be a great opportunity to not only race in front of a massive crowd, but also the Aston Martin factory race team will be there with their LMP1 car; not bad people to impress!  As excited as I am, I have to be cautiously optimistic as there are a number of challenges we will face in the coming weekend.  For one, I have only raced this car one time, and it was a last minute deal for the Autobahn Grand Prix, and since then I only have one real test day in it (thanks Chicago weather!).  Also, we are operating on a smaller budget than some of the other teams, so while many drivers have fancy no-lift-shift sequential gearboxes, line-locks, launch control, traction control and ABS braking systems- it's just me and the Aston!  I will be using a synchro-mesh streetcar gearbox (meaning I have to heel-and-toe down shift) and don't have any traction control or other electronic aids; however I grew up watching my dad drive Trans-Am and GT-1 cars and that stuff wasn't even invented yet!  All racecar drivers can give you a long list of excuses as to why their car will be slow or they might not perform, but really the old saying is still true - "when the green flag drops, the bulls*** stops!"  My crew has been putting in an unbelievable amount of effort over the last few months, so really my goal is just not to crash and waste all of their hard work!  Truly though, I think that even with all of this adversity I can still produce a good result through some smart, cautiously aggressive driving.

Also, what many of you might not know, is that the series is now a multi-class series where different classes of cars will be racing at the same time.  I am going to be in the GT series, but we will also have slower GTS and TC cars out there as well thrown into the mix.  Add that combination into a tight and twisty, concrete-lined street course and you are going to have one heck of a race.  There are also some prominent drivers running in the various classes: GM factory driver Ron Fellows will be in a Corvette and Patrick Dempsey (aka Dr. McDreamy!) will be running in GTS class and will ensure that our race gets plenty of media attention (he's also a great driver too).  If you have the opportunity to visit the Long Beach Grand Prix please stop by the Lake Forest Sportscars pits and say hi; if not, try to catch the race on VERSUS which will be aired on May 1st at 4:30 pm.  

 After the race I am going to take a few days to meet up with some of my friends from UCSB and drive out to Idyllwild, CA to get in some hiking and snake catching (everyone's dream vacation right?) and then head up to Santa Barbara for my SAE alumni weekend.  Hopefully I will have some neat pictures to post up here when I get back (probably from Idyllwild, I don't think the reunion pictures will make it online...).  Thanks to everyone who wished me luck and I look forward to a great result!  

Thanks,

-Nick