PRUETT: Hard-Fought And Earned

Le Mans / ALMS

PRUETT: Hard-Fought And Earned

Racing in the shadow of a famous brother is never easy. Moving out from that shadow is even harder, but that’s just what Marino Franchitti did last year.

Marshall Pruett | Posted January 20, 2011 Fremont, CA

With equal measures of talent and determination, Marino Franchitti finally achieved his dream--to become a championship-winning sports car driver--on merit. (LAT)

If you haven’t figured it out by now, I’m a sucker for a good underdog story.

In a sport filled with hyper-competitive personalities, genuine care and warmth between drivers is always hard to come by. Finding drivers who are willing to gush about a teammate or rival is even harder, but with Marino Franchitti, Highcroft Racing’s 2010 American Le Mans LMP champion (along with co-drivers David Brabham and Simon Pagenaud), you have the rare exception.

After more than a decade of fighting to earn his place in the sport, the 32-year-old younger brother of IndyCar star Dario Franchitti finally added his name to the rostrum of winners of a major auto racing series.

As Marino would find in the weeks and months after claiming the LMP title last October, legions of supporters within sports car racing on both sides of the Atlantics—from drivers to team owners to mechanics—reached out to offer their heartfelt congratulations for an accomplishment that was richly deserved.

The motivation behind the hundreds of calls, e-mails and text messages came from the odds Marino had to overcome since entering the sport in the late 1990s. While drivers like Ralf Schumacher and Kyle Busch clearly benefitted from the preferential treatment brought by having championship-winning siblings, that wasn’t the case for Marino, who was often dismissed as nothing more than “Dario’s little brother.”

Had Marino chosen to pursue a career in open-wheel racing, it’s possible the Schumacher and Busch treatment would have come his way, but with his heart set on sports cars, Franchitti was on his own. He watched as his older brother shot through the European open-wheel ranks, and later as Mercedes-Benz placed him in the CART series in 1997. 15 years later, and with three IndyCar championships and two Indy 500 wins to his credit, Dario’s place in open-wheel history is secure.

Franchitti strapped himself into a number of heaps over the years, including this Spyker, to keep his career afloat while hoping to be recognized by one of the bigger and better teams. (LAT)

If the Franchitti brothers starred in a soap opera, Marino’s character would be riddled with jealousy and constantly plotting to ruin Dario’s career. That’s the sensationalized version of how such things are handled, but Marino’s reality is altogether different. In reality, he’s gone in the opposite direction.

There’s no bitterness, and no hint of jealously or entitlement. He’s easily in the top-5 of all-time glass-is-half-full greats. IndyCar fans have grown accustomed to seeing Dario’s dogged determination behind the wheel, while sports car insiders have marveled at Marino’s persistence to establish his own name in motor racing.

If Dario rocketed to the top of his sport and stayed there (OK, we’ll forget the foray into NASCAR), Marino simmered well below the surface, toiling away in rides and series that weren’t always deserving of his skills. It was a Catch-22. By driving for an unknown or under-skilled team, Marino’s only hope was to stand out as the best of the drivers piloting the car. Yet, by driving for a lesser team, results were hard to come by and critics were left to ponder why Dario’s younger brother struggled to establish himself in the closed-wheel ranks.

Marino broke out of the cycle when he landed with Andretti-Green Racing’s Acura ALMS program in 2007, but the lines between perception and reality became blurred before the season came to an end. Originally signed for three races, AGR put Marino behind the wheel of the Acura eight times that year, but when Dario left the team to join Chip Ganassi’s Sprint Cup program prior to the season finale, they sent Marino packing as well.

On the surface, and as a few wags wrote at the time, it appeared as if Marino’s deal was tied to Dario’s contract, but those allegations were false. After a brief taste of a top drive, the biggest test of Marino’s career would be to find a similar ride on his own for 2008. Had he done enough at AGR to remain in prototypes, or would he be forced back to a mid-field GT team?

The answer came with a call from sports car royalty. After witnessing his drives in the Acura, and with the recommendation first made the Porsche factory, Dyson Racing drafted Franchitti in to share one of their two Porsche RS Spyders for the 2008 ALMS season. After impressing in the Porsche, Dyson would retain his services for their two-car Mazda LMP2 campaign in 2009.

Two-time 24 Hours of Le Mans winner Allan McNish—an ardent support of his countryman—says it was only a matter of time until Marino would find the right team to showcase his abilities.

“Everything Marino’s got in his career he’s worked hard for and fought hard for,” he said. “Since he’s gotten himself a full-time ride, he’s really flourished. I don’t think people realize that until he got himself into the situation with Dyson Racing, every season he’d had in racing was only part-time. So to be able to jump in and out of different cars and categories has held him in good stead because he’s very adaptable, but he’s also really fast. His [LMP2] pole at Sebring last year proved that; he lit up the time sheets.”

Marino impressed in Andretti-Green's Acura, catching the attention of the Porsche factory when the German marque began considering drivers to aid their new ALMS customer program. (LAT)

Scoring Mazda’s first proper ALMS win at Lime Rock in ’09, Franchitti, along with teammates Butch Leitzinger and Ben Devlin, earned a hugely popular win for the team at the 10-hour Petit Le Mans race, capping his breakout season. Three poles, three fastest laps and two wins from 10 races did wonders for Marino’s stock. Hopes for a championship run in 2010 seemed to be on the cards, but those plans soon went awry.

Notified just days after his wedding, Dyson’s down-sized, single-car program for 2010 left Franchitti unemployed as the new season approached. Sporting Director Chris Dyson and his usual co-driver, Le Mans winner Guy Smith, got the nod. But, just as Marino’s performances at AGR caught the attention of Dyson, his drives in the Porsche and the Lola-Mazda drew the interest from the top ALMS prototype team. A central theme in Marino’s driving career—falling up, rather than down—was about to play out once again.

An offer came from Highcroft Racing, the 2009 ALMS LMP1 champions, to fill the role of 3rd driver for the four long races of the year. It wasn’t the full-time seat he desired, but with so few prototype drives left in the ALMS, and with a legitimate chance to win the biggest ALMS/ACO races of the year—Sebring, Le Mans, Laguna Seca and Petit Le Mans—Highcroft’s tender was signed immediately.

In his time at AGR and Dyson, Franchitti had amazing drivers to learn from and measure himself against, but more often than not, he was the fastest driver in the car. At Highcroft, and paired with David Brabham—one of the two best sports car drivers of his generation, and Simon Pagenaud, one of the fastest open-wheel drivers on the planet, Marino faced his greatest challenge yet.

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