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SAINI: A Mere 13-Points
I relish the chance for all of us at Tri Point to get up, dust ourselves off, and stake our claim on the 2010 SPEED Touring Car Championship.
Jason Saini  | http://www.jasonsaini.com  |  Posted November 16, 2009   Cresson, TX
After coming so close to winning the SPEED TC title, the banquet was bittersweet for Saini and his partners at Mazda. (Saini)
It's over... the season that wasn't supposed to happen in the first place, had an impossible finish. By impossible, I mean impossible to predict and impossible to believe. Well, except for me! Coming into the finale, we had a pretty slim points lead. It sounded big... '54 points!' really sounded impressive. But I needed to have a very strong race, especially if my rival did too. Everyone kept nearly congratulating me for the title, but I knew how close things really were.

Well, let's just say my rival had an amazing weekend. And I didn't. If Pierre Kleinubing had a 'perfect' weekend, meaning winning pole and leading the most laps on the way to winning, I needed to score 4th place to win the title. Well, he had the perfect weekend and I could only manage an 8th place effort. So the points lead we had held since I first talked to you all after my NJ win, nine races ago, was gone. The final tally? Championship lost by a mere 13-points. That's out of a thousand points, so we're talking an extraordinarily close finish.

I have to congratulate the whole Realtime gang for really putting the pressure one when needed. They had to come to Mazda Raceway and dominate, and that's what they did. Hats off to them for a stellar comeback, but an even bigger hats off to my team for such a gutsy season. All the hard work, short-handed long hours and sacrifice paid off in one of the closest championships in quite some time.

I like reading quotes from famous people, especially exceptional leaders. Like the best song lyrics, they always tend to strike a chord and really capture how we feel. They can be a source of encouragement, and motivation. And in times of defeat, they can be of great consolation. Not that we have anything to be ashamed of. For a season that had such a shaky start, and in very uncertain times, we came further than anyone (including us,) thought was possible.

But back to the quotes... I think if you're an athlete or competitor of any kind, you have respect for Vince Lombardi. Some of the things he said are epic in their simplicity and power. And he knew how to deal with defeat. He understood that defeat was a necessary part of success. But more importantly, while he recognized that – he was completely driven to win, unsatisfied with anything less than wins and championships. He didn't accept defeat at all, and to me that's an important trait for a habitual winner.

“The measure of who we are is what we do with what we have.” -Vince Lombardi. Second place in the points, for both driver and manufacturer; most pole positions, most laps led, and tied for most wins. It's hard to even imagine a team as good as Tri-Point as the 'underdog,' but this year due to budget constraints I don't think anyone would argue that we were the underdogs. Despite the deficit in funding to our competitors, the team dug deep down to haul in those results. Everyone from the shop to the track needs to be extremely proud of what we did this season with so little.

Mazda stepped up, Tri-Point stepped up, The Autobarn Mazda stepped up, Harrah's Grand Prix stepped up, friends and supporters all stepped up. The teamwork, guts and determination shown this year is maybe something I may never experience again. However, I am richer for it, having been immersed in such a situation will only make us all stronger through our next challenges. And when times are better, and budgets recover – we will still have the same hunger and passion that drove our success this year.

It's been pretty tough since the race weekend. I've been hearing a lot of 'that's racing,' and 'you'll get them next time,' and anything else to make me feel better. While I truly appreciate all the love and support that I've received, a better understanding of how I feel can be found in another Vince Lombardi quote: “If you can accept losing, you can't win.” This really captures how I feel, and how I drive myself. While I may seem 'too hard on myself' to some, this is an essential component in my personal drive to succeed.
Saini prepares for the final race of the season at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca. (Saini)

Put another way, Lombardi says: “Winning is not a sometime thing; it's an all time thing. You don't win once in a while, you don't do things right once in a while, you do them right all the time. Winning is habit. Unfortunately, so is losing.” And I think in many ways most of our team this year felt the same way. So it was a bitter pill to lead the way most of the year and then lose at the very last moment.

It's really hard to put a finger on why we couldn't challenge for either championship at our home track of Mazda Raceway. It's a track where the team and our MAZDA6's are historically quite strong. For whatever reason, we just didn't seem to have enough pace. The BMW's got an adjustment, lowering their weight, right before their podium sweep at Road Atlanta... and the Acuras were simply strong at Mazda raceway. For whatever reason, they saved the best for last and were uncharacteristically strong compared to the rest of the season.

We've talked about this before, but while there aren't that many cars on the grid – they are all quite fast and capable of winning. This is a double-edged sword – it makes it easier to finish in the top-10, but it also means that if you have a bit of an off day you're in 10th place. To be sure, we're going to go back over the data and the setups, and try to understand why the success didn't come. We made good changes to the car all weekend long – and while it never completely changed it's character, it was transformed in terms of driveability over the course of the weekend.

Getting back to the important factor of Tri-Point's hard work this year, Mazda Raceway was the debut for Mazda's newest entry into SPEED World Challenge Touring Car, the 2010 MAZDA3. This car is incredibly important for a number of reasons. First, because it represents the latest in engineering and fabrication excellence from Mazda's factory squad. Talented engineer/designer Kenyon Whetsell and lead fabricator Joe Capauno worked with owner Craig Nagler to design and build a stunning racecar. As with any new car build, countless hours were spent making everything work right and their effort in getting this car on track at Mazda Raceway was titanic.

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Jason Saini

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