SPA24: Friday Notebook

Le Mans / ALMS

SPA24: Friday Notebook

Richard Dean’s Latest Adventure, Challenges of Spa 24 & Spa 2003 Rewind

John Dagys | Posted July 30, 2010 Francorchamps, (BEL)

With no on-track activity for Spa 24 competitors, Friday was a bit of a rest day for many teams. (John Dagys)

Richard Dean’s Latest Adventure

While United Autosports may be an upstart organization in the GT racing world, it’s certainly made up from a team of veterans that are no strangers to the sport. Richard Dean is one of those figures.

As the co-owner and managing director of the team, Dean is in charge of the team’s U.K.-based operations. But like co-owner Zak Brown, Dean began his love affair with racing as one of England’s talents in the open-wheel ladder.

Competing in British Formula Ford, British Formula 3 and eventually working his way up to International Formula 3000, Dean was considered by many to have the talent to make it into F1. But when the going got rough, he took up new opportunities on the other side of the sport.

“From racing, I realized that when I got to Formula 3000 in the mid-90s and ran out of money and went into debt, I wasn’t going to make a living in Formula One as a driver,” Dean said. “I wanted to stay in the sport, so I started to coach drivers. My first job as a full-season coach was with Dan Wheldon, who’s obviously doing very well in the States. The following year, I worked with Justin Wilson, then Tomas Scheckter. I was very lucky with those for my first three years.

Prior to starting up United Autosports, Richard Dean (m) was the managing director at Ginetta-Zytek. (John Dagys)

“That gave me an insight behind the teams. Since then, I’ve been involved with being team manager or running teams in Formula Ford and Formula Renault in the U.K. Then we ran the Panoz at Le Mans and in the Le Mans Series. When Zak and I started talking about this, one year ago, it was from a standing start, but in my head, I knew where we had to be. We really only got the keys for our workshop on the second week of January. But here we are with a two-car operation for the 24 Hours.”

While Dean essentially played double-duty during his time running various organizations, including Team LNT’s Panoz Esperante effort, where he scored the GT2 class win at Le Mans as a driver, he’s taken a slight step back from the cockpit this year.

However, he’s racing here this weekend in the No. 68 Audi R8 LMS with Brown and F1 stars Mark Blundell and Eddie Cheever. While it’s not the first time Dean has driven the Audi, having competed at the team’s first-ever race at Oulton Park in April, he’s looking forward to getting behind the wheel again.

“It’s hard doing both properly,” Dean said. “So when I’m here as a driver, it’s really difficult to switch off. I’m used to it, but my partner [Zak Brown] is probably the biggest workaholic around. I can’t really complain because when I see his schedule and what he gets through...”

Dean has also been pleased with the team’s progress thus far. He’s assembled a talented group of people with one of the most successful GT3 cars and the star drivers for this weekend’s 24 Hour. There’s not much more one could ask for.

“While I still have experience in doing it, it’s still shocking in the detail and workload from this point to the operational side to delivery and all of the details,” Dean said. “But I think as in any business, if you put experienced people around you, they ease you through the whole job. We’re pretty happy with where we’re at.”

Patrick Long on Challenges of Spa 24

On paper, endurance classics such as Le Mans, Daytona and Spa should all be fairly alike. After all, each are twice-around-the-clock contests that both test man and machine. But as Porsche factory driver Patrick Long points out, there are vast differences that sets Spa apart from the rest.

“The number one difference is the weather,” Long said. “It’s changing and it’s changing so quickly that you have to be able to adapt to not only the conditions but the mental aspect. You can’t just dive in for tires if it’s raining because it changes so quickly. It might just be a shower that you have to endure.

Patrick Long knows the keys to success for nearly every major sportscar race. Can that translate into his first Spa 24 win on Sunday? (John Dagys)

“Sometimes you have a shower under yellow and by the time you’re back to green, it’s dry again. It’s pretty wild. A lot of times, you’ll have rain on one side of the race track and not on the other because you cover so much land.

“The other side of it is that it’s much darker than at Le Mans. For me, it gives you a bigger challenge at night. I think it’s one of the purest GT races around, maybe up there with the Nurburgring 24 Hours as one of the rawest and most challenging GT races out there.”

Long, a class winner at Daytona and Le Mans, seeks his first victory in the Spa 24 Hours this weekend. It’s been something that’s eluded the 29-year-old American after three previous attempts.

He’s returned to Spa with IMSA Performance Matmut as part of an impressive lineup in the squad’s lead Porsche 911 GT3 RSR. Long teams with fellows works drivers Patrick Pilet and Richard Lietz, plus the ever-improving Raymond Narac.

With the departure of the GT1 machines from this year’s race, GT2 cars stand a good chance of achieving overall victory here, something that gives Long even more motivation this weekend.

“I think it’s more of a motivator,” Long said. “It makes getting on the airplane that much easier. Coming to Spa, it’s one of those races that I feel I remain connected with Europe. Not only with the people, but the atmosphere and the culture. I love it. I’ve done the last four in a row and hopefully will continue on.

“It’s really down to Spa and the Nurburgring that are the two remaining endurance races that are alluding me. I’m going to be attacking those full swing until they come.”

Race Rewind: 2003 Spa 24 Hours

While a GT2 car could be poised to claim overall honors this year, it wouldn’t be the first time a similar spec machine has taken the outright win. Despite the more powerful GT1 cars headlining the Spa 24 Hours for nearly the past decade, the 2003 edition produced one of the major upsets in the endurance racing world.

Freisinger Motorsport pulled off the upset overall victory here in 2003. (DPPI/FIA GT)

The same year that The Racer’s Group scored pulled off the overall win at the Rolex 24 at Daytona with its GT-spec Porsche, a similarly prepared 911 GT3-RS in the hands of German endurance specialists Freisinger Motorsport outlasted the GT1 field at Spa to score an historic overall victory.

Despite the leading GT1 and GTN machines sweeping the top-18 qualifying positions that year, the Freisinger machine of Stephane Ortelli, Romain Dumas and Marc Lieb took the lead by the third hour, thanks to early rain showers and an array of mechanical woes for the leading cars.

With on and off showers, the N-GT class Porsche enjoyed a spirited fight with the No. 1 Larbre Competition Dodge Viper GTS-R through the night. By morning, under drying conditions, the Porsche miraculously still held the lead, just as the Larbre Viper hit trouble.

An off into the gravel followed by gearbox failure cost the Jack Leconte-led crew 15 laps and any shot of the overall victory. While the Viper soldiered on for a fourth place overall finish, it was clear sailing for the Porsche trio, finishing six laps ahead of the nearest competition, a BMS Scuderia Italia Ferrari 550 Maranello in second.

“The race started very, very well for us because we were not fighting with the other N-GT cars,” Ortelli said after the race. “They were much quicker in the dry. I was just quicker in the rain, so I tried to stay in control of the situation. We were second when the rain came.

“At that time I came back to the pit and Marc took the car. The Porsche was just unbelievably good in the rain and the Dunlop tires were fantastic too. They compromised for the fact that we have less horsepower than the big cars. Without the rain I do not think we could have won.”

Could a similar upset be in the cards for this year’s edition, with a GT3 car taking top honors instead of the favorites in GT2 or GTN? Rain isn’t in the forecast for the race, but that doesn’t mean much here. As I’ve learned since arriving here on Wednesday, be sure to take your raincoat everywhere!

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

John Dagys

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