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GRAND-AM
GRAND-AM: Pew Wins Trueman Award
Four Pro-Am wins in seven years for Michael Shank Racing drivers in GRAND-AM...
John Pew picked up his second consecutive Trueman Award after his best season yet in Rolex Series competition. (Photo: John Dagys)
Following the final round of the 2011 GRAND-AM Rolex Sports Car Series season, Michael Shank Racing driver John Pew was confirmed as the 2011 Trueman Award winner, which goes to the top Pro-Am racer in the Daytona Prototype ranks.
It is fitting to have the honor confirmed following the EMCO Gears Classic, as the award is named for Jim Trueman, who was the driving force behind the rejuvenation and renovation of Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. Trueman won a pair of SCCA National Championships and went on to win the Indianapolis 500 as an owner for Columbus native Bobby Rahal in 1985.
The Pro-Am award utilizes a separate scoring system and is operated as a championship-within-a-championship. In determining the eligibility of a Pro-Am competitor, the driver's primary source of income cannot be from driving race cars in any series at any time in the past five years. At the end of the season, the award winners receive a customized hand-crafted award manufactured by Steuben Glass. There is also a pair of perpetual trophies engraved with each year’s winner that remain on permanent display at GRAND-AM headquarters in Daytona Beach, Florida.
The 2011 honor marks the second consecutive year to see Pew score the accomplishment.
“It’s nice to get the recognition as the top Pro-Am driver, although my core goal is to do as well as I can, no matter who it is I am up against,” said Pew, who joined Michael Shank Racing during the 2007 season.
Pew has in fact shown well against the full field of racers, pro and am alike. The team often taps Pew for qualifying duties, and he’s responded to that confidence with a series of impressive results, including a best of fifth at the legendary Road America circuit in June.
“Qualifying is exciting because it is just 15 minutes of just getting everything you can out of the car. No pit stops, no GT traffic, just one session to find that perfect lap on the tires and in clean air,” said Pew. “It’s a very straight forward way to benchmark your performance, and even though I’ve had a few qualifying sessions that I wasn’t happy about this year, overall I think we continued to improve that area over last season.”
“John is being modest when he says that,” offered Team Owner Mike Shank. “For him to go up against the best of the best and have the performances that he has had, really is just incredible for someone who hasn’t been racing all his life. He’s also stepped it up with his racecraft as well. We leaned on him pretty hard at New Jersey--it was almost 140 degrees in that car, and he did two nearly full stints for us. Guess all that karting in the Florida summer does pay off!”
The Jim Trueman Award, which was established in 2005, has now been won by a Michael Shank Racing driver four times, with Mark Patterson becoming the first two-time winner in 2009 after first winning it in his first full-time GRAND-AM effort (2006).
The common thread in all those accomplishments has been co-driver Ozz Negri, who co-drove with Patterson before joining up with Pew in 2010.
“There is always a compromise in sports car racing when you have two drivers, and that can sometimes be exaggerated when it is a Pro-Am combination,” said Negri. “This is a team sport, so it is important for the car not to just be comfortable for me to be fast over just one lap, but it has to be something that is a good platform for John to be fast, both in qualifying and in the race.”
Negri slips easily into the role, having long been leaned on not just for his lap times and race craft, but for his ability to tune a car and train drivers to get the most out of them.
That skill set has been put to good use with some big names in the sport as he was test driver and driver coach for both the Barber Doge Pro Series and Formula BMW USA providing tutelage to drivers including AJ Allmendinger, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Robert Wickens, Tommy Milner, and Graham Rahal.
“What Ozz does is pretty incredible,” offered Shank. “He wears a lot of hats for us, and he does it well.”
“Even though winning the Pro-Am trophy comes down to John and all of his hard work, with all the karting and studying data and training that he does, it still makes me very proud of his performance,” said Negri. “This team is so consistent, and the car preparation is second to none. We’ve shown for many years that we can go and compete with the best of them, so it is very gratifying for John to win the Trueman Award again, and I couldn’t be happier for him.”
It is fitting to have the honor confirmed following the EMCO Gears Classic, as the award is named for Jim Trueman, who was the driving force behind the rejuvenation and renovation of Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course. Trueman won a pair of SCCA National Championships and went on to win the Indianapolis 500 as an owner for Columbus native Bobby Rahal in 1985.
The Pro-Am award utilizes a separate scoring system and is operated as a championship-within-a-championship. In determining the eligibility of a Pro-Am competitor, the driver's primary source of income cannot be from driving race cars in any series at any time in the past five years. At the end of the season, the award winners receive a customized hand-crafted award manufactured by Steuben Glass. There is also a pair of perpetual trophies engraved with each year’s winner that remain on permanent display at GRAND-AM headquarters in Daytona Beach, Florida.
The 2011 honor marks the second consecutive year to see Pew score the accomplishment.
“It’s nice to get the recognition as the top Pro-Am driver, although my core goal is to do as well as I can, no matter who it is I am up against,” said Pew, who joined Michael Shank Racing during the 2007 season.
Pew has in fact shown well against the full field of racers, pro and am alike. The team often taps Pew for qualifying duties, and he’s responded to that confidence with a series of impressive results, including a best of fifth at the legendary Road America circuit in June.
“Qualifying is exciting because it is just 15 minutes of just getting everything you can out of the car. No pit stops, no GT traffic, just one session to find that perfect lap on the tires and in clean air,” said Pew. “It’s a very straight forward way to benchmark your performance, and even though I’ve had a few qualifying sessions that I wasn’t happy about this year, overall I think we continued to improve that area over last season.”
“John is being modest when he says that,” offered Team Owner Mike Shank. “For him to go up against the best of the best and have the performances that he has had, really is just incredible for someone who hasn’t been racing all his life. He’s also stepped it up with his racecraft as well. We leaned on him pretty hard at New Jersey--it was almost 140 degrees in that car, and he did two nearly full stints for us. Guess all that karting in the Florida summer does pay off!”
The Jim Trueman Award, which was established in 2005, has now been won by a Michael Shank Racing driver four times, with Mark Patterson becoming the first two-time winner in 2009 after first winning it in his first full-time GRAND-AM effort (2006).
The common thread in all those accomplishments has been co-driver Ozz Negri, who co-drove with Patterson before joining up with Pew in 2010.
“There is always a compromise in sports car racing when you have two drivers, and that can sometimes be exaggerated when it is a Pro-Am combination,” said Negri. “This is a team sport, so it is important for the car not to just be comfortable for me to be fast over just one lap, but it has to be something that is a good platform for John to be fast, both in qualifying and in the race.”
Negri slips easily into the role, having long been leaned on not just for his lap times and race craft, but for his ability to tune a car and train drivers to get the most out of them.
That skill set has been put to good use with some big names in the sport as he was test driver and driver coach for both the Barber Doge Pro Series and Formula BMW USA providing tutelage to drivers including AJ Allmendinger, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Robert Wickens, Tommy Milner, and Graham Rahal.
“What Ozz does is pretty incredible,” offered Shank. “He wears a lot of hats for us, and he does it well.”
“Even though winning the Pro-Am trophy comes down to John and all of his hard work, with all the karting and studying data and training that he does, it still makes me very proud of his performance,” said Negri. “This team is so consistent, and the car preparation is second to none. We’ve shown for many years that we can go and compete with the best of them, so it is very gratifying for John to win the Trueman Award again, and I couldn’t be happier for him.”
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