Blast from the Past

About two weeks ago the ALMS posted the broadcast video of the 1998 Petit Le Mans on YouTube. It was a 90min highlights package of the 10-hour race, but it was my first opportunity to see the state of the art in North American endurance racing in 1998, the year before the ALMS came into being. If you haven't seen this race before it is worth a look.

On December 22nd John Dagys announced the date that the combined ALMS/Grand-Am series would announce  the new class structure for the 2014 season: At the “Roar Before the Rolex” on January 4th.

What do these two events have to do with one another? Well, back in 1998 there were 7 classes of cars in the race. The reason there were so many was that endurance racing had been on the decline since  about 1993, and in order to make up a decent field IMSA had to include cars built to at least two differing rule sets, IMSA's and ACO's. Sound familiar? The very next year, the ALMS began and were able to adopt a single rule set guiding homologation, and the field at Petit Le Mans went from 31 in  7 classes in 1998 to 50 in 3 classes in 1999. Teams were ready for a new series.

The class structure for the 1998 Petit Le Mans should be a guide for this new combined series: accommodate current reality and migrate toward a common ruleset during a short transition period. This is the strategy that I suggested in a previous posting. I hope something like this is what we will get on January 4th. Not many days until we know the answer.

Here are the classes for Petit Le Mans 1998 and 1999. BTW, in  1998 a Ferrari 333 SP (LMP1) won overall but the fastest qualifier was a Porsche 911 GT1-98 (LMGT1) which DNFed.

Men in Sheds

One of the aspects of motor sport that I miss from the era of my youth are the experimental cars produced not by the factories, but by individuals and teams. They added diversity, personality, and interest to the sport. These cars of my youth (1950's - 1970's) made by "men in sheds" showed up, not only at the Indy 500, but in sports cars and even Formula 1. We may think of Ferrari and McLaren as OEM's and constructors now, but they were started by individuals in more modest circumstances at the time.

In the 1966 film "Grand Prix" Pete Aron (James Garner) won the world championship, but it was actually Jack Brabham in his own car powered by the Repco V8 that won that year.

The Repco V8 was based on an Oldsmobile F-85 3.5L aluminum engine. Brabham and the Australian parts company Repco developed the SOHC heads for the Olds block and added a bearing girdle to the bottom-end, put it into a Brabham chassis and went racing. It was not the most powerful engine on the grid, but it turned out to be more reliable than the competition and Brabham won the drivers championship in 1966 and the constructors titles in 1966 and 1967 with it. By the way, the Buick variant of that block was licensed to Rover and was the basis for Rover V8s for decades.

There was apparently something in the atmosphere surrounding the Brabham team. Two of Brabham's drivers went on to build their own cars, found their own teams, and become constructors themselves: Dan Gurney and Bruce McLaren. I feel that if Dan Gurney had stuck with Brabham for one more year (he left after the 1965 season), we might very well have had one more American driving champion in 1966.

If Dan had stuck with Brabham in 1966, we might have never seen the AAR Gurney-Eagles. Dan remains the only American to win a Grand Prix in a car bearing his name as constructor. AAR also produced successful Indy Eagles, and sports cars, culminating in the Eagle-Toyota MkIII GTP of 1992-1993. Dan was the instigator behind the Gurney-Weslake cylinder heads for small-block Ford V8s that were instrumental in the Le Mans wins for JWAE-Gulf Ford GT40s in 1968 and 1969, as well as the Formula 1 Gurney-Weslake V12 engine powering Dan's Eagle F1 car.

When Bruce McLaren left Brabham he built and raced successful formula cars, Indy cars and Can-Am sports cars. McLaren now has become one of the mainstays of Formula 1 and produces sports cars for the road and track, the latest being the MP4-12C. Seeing McLaren today, it is hard to believe how humble the McLaren operation was at the beginning.

The Indianapolis 500 used to be a showcase of one-off and experimental cars. Mickey Thompson always fielded something interesting as did Smokey Yunick, even if they were not terribly successful. I vividly recall Parnelli Jones's 1967 STP turbine car losing the race in the final laps due to a $5.00 part failing. (An aside: Parnelli and his partner Vel Miletich lived in my home town.) This era was very far away from today's spec Dallara DW-12 cars.

One of the most innovative and influential car designers is Jim Hall. His Chaparrals of the 1960's are arguably the beginning of modern automotive aerodynamics.

I doubt that there is any race fan who has not heard of Carroll Shelby. Shelby was not the first to come up with the notion of putting a big engine in a lightweight sports car, but he is arguably the most successful. After driving for Sydney Allard (another man who put a big American V8 in an English sports car) and Aston Martin, Carroll put a Ford V8 into the AC Ace to create the Cobra, founding Shelby American right up the road from my childhood home at the former Lance Reventlow Scarab shop in Venice California (Reventlow was one of the rich men in sheds). The Cobra is still the only American car to win the FIA World Sportscar Championship (in 1965), defeating Ferrari and Porsche.

Many things have contributed to the decline of car/engine diversity and individuality in motor sport. Safety regulations and strict testing are necessary and laudable, but it makes building your own car difficult and expensive. The trend toward cost-controls have encouraged spec cars, effectively preventing one-offs by regulation. Modern materials and production techniques, along with the required crash-testing and certification, not to mention the high costs of wind-tunnel time and engineering, tends to price individuals out of the market. Cars have become much more sophisticated and the people qualified to design and build them are relatively scarce.

I think it would be desirable to bring back "men in sheds" to motor sport. Perhaps not in formula cars or Indy cars, but at least in sports cars. What got me thinking about a way to do this was the Le Mans Garage 56 project and the Deltawing. To reduce development time and lower costs, the basic "tub" was adapted from the Aston Martin AMR-1 (another AMR-1 tub ended up in the Pescarolo LMP1 at Le Mans). This tub had already gone through crash-testing and certification by the FIA, so the Deltawing constructor (Dan Gurney's AAR) didn't have to spend the time and money to re-invent the wheel.

What if there were mass produced, basic safety-cell tubs, tested and certified, that could be incorporated into cars built by men in sheds? This might allow individuals and teams to design their own suspension, bodywork, control systems, and drive trains more readily and save significant time and money in construction, testing and certification. The effect of Moore's Law combined with the ongoing development in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) acting to reduce expensive wind-tunnel time, could herald a new flowering of those wonderful one-off cars that have been missing from the grid for such a long time. This approach would work best in a (currently non-existent) lightweight prototype class that encourages innovation.

Calendars and Coverage for 2013

Next week begins the long winter off-season for International endurance racing, only the final round of the WEC remains to be run. For me that round will take place at 2:00AM Sunday morning on a Dailymotion video stream. I may have to take a nap first. For the ALMS and the ELMS the season ended at Petit Le Mans last Saturday.

Here are some odds and ends looking forward toward 2013.

All three ACO-rules series have released their provisional calendars for the 2013 season. I have combined them and listed them in chronological order:

I have created a public Google Calendar for the ALMS, ELMS, and WEC combined and named it "ACO Racing 2013". I will be updating it and adding information as the year progresses. There are three links to this calendar: HTML, XML, and iCal. All times will be for the U.S. East Coast time zone (EST/EDT, GMT-5/GMT-4) and I'll include maps, race local times, and event schedules as they become available. The first date on the calendar is March 16th 2013.

UPDATE: I have added the dates and locations of the Asian Le Mans Series to the "ACO Racing 2013" calendar.

Further UPDATE: There is a newer post about the 2014 calendars here

There is good reason to hope that the Sebring ALMS round might attract WEC and ELMS entrants, as well as the full-season ALMS competitors, as a tune-up for Le Mans even though it is no longer part of the WEC. Historically Sebring has been utilized in this way, and it is good to see that there are no time conflicts so that it can continue this role.

There remain several dates that conflict with one another, the most troubling is the Fuji WEC round conflicting with the ALMS Petit Le Mans. This year's Petit Le Mans was won overall by team Rebellion's LMP1 Lola/Toyota; they are privateer champions in the WEC. The race was much enriched by Rebellion's presence, especially during the early laps before Muscle Milk's LMP1 HPD/Honda had a major shunt while leading that took them out of contention for the race win. Next year the calendar will likely prevent any guest entrants from the WEC.

I would love to be at the Circuit of the Americas next September for the ALMS/WEC "Super Endurance Weekend". It is going to be the place to be if you want to see the greatest diversity of exotic race cars and their teams in the world. Unfortunately that is the height of hurricane season on St. Thomas and I can't leave my University professor wife on her own at that time of year as she is stuck here teaching.

The ACO have done some smart things to bolster the re-launched ELMS. Changing the format to 3-hour races, sharing the Silverstone weekend with the WEC, and adding additional support races. I just hope these changes are enough to keep the ELMS going. Not all teams can afford to compete in the WEC.

During the Petit Le Mans coverage (around lap 265) Scott Atherton, ALMS CEO, made his way into the announcer's booth and conveyed some information from his "State of the Series" presentation made earlier in the day. Among the most important things he conveyed was further information on the 2013 TV coverage which was accompanied by this graphic:

What is shown here as "Fox Media" is what used to be known as "Speed TV". The length of the Sebring and Petit Le Mans events were not suited to the 2-hour highlight broadcasts that were the only televised formats for them this year with ESPN/ABC; so, wisely they will be covered by Speed/Fox. That is good news for most fans, but unless things change, I am unable to get SpeedTV here in America's paradise and I'm geo-blocked from speedtv.com's videos. Atherton assured the audience that live Internet streaming of entire races and qualifying would continue, but could not say by which "portals" yet. As long as St. Thomas is still considered "International", I should be able to get video from the ALMS web site.

Right here I want to congratulate the ALMS for fixing their early-season technical problems with streaming. For the Baltimore, VIR, and Petit Le Mans rounds, streaming coverage was rock-solid and high quality, even better than the ESPNPlayer streams (higher sustained bit-rate, and no buffering). Atherton acknowledged the problem in his "State of the Series" presentation, and attributed the fix to changing "vendors". Let's hope that the "portals" chosen for next year are at least as good as the ones used for those final 3 rounds.

By the way, you can get a transcript of Atherton's "State of the Series" presentation here.

Not much new information was forthcoming about the merger or the 2014 season. The "moral imperative" of "getting it right" was re-iterated. We won't hear much solid new information until the Daytona 24 in January.

There was some good news for endurance racing last week: teams running Lola cars may actually have hope for spare parts and race support. Multimatic Engineering and Haas Auto have licensed Lola intellectual property and acquired the physical assets of Lola Cars. After watching Patrick Dempsey's shunt on Saturday, I would say he needs more than a few spares ASAP.

Let's hope that the 2013 season, ALMS's last, will be a banner one.

Light, Fast and Efficient

At the Donington Park round of the ELMS, one of the support series was the Speed Euroseries. Radiolemans.com's coverage of Donington included commentary on the Euroseries races and qualifying. This was my first exposure to this very interesting series. The car formula was of particular interest. The cars conform to the FIA "Group CN" specs. with additional restrictions: use of a 2.0L Honda engine and spec Cooper tires. Diverse chassis are in use within the Euroseries from several manufacturers: Wolf Racing, Juno, Norma, Ligier, WFR Ltd. Recently, Oreca have announced that they will sell a closed-cockpit CN chassis for 2013. The FIA Group CN regulations allow the use of engines from less than 1.0L up to 3.0L with a sliding scale of minimum weights from 475kg to 625kg. The Euroseries competitor with the 2.0L Honda had a typical weight of 570kg. Engines must be homologated production-based engines, naturally aspirated, with a maximum of 6 cylinders. Rotary engines are allowed, but are given a multiplier of 1.5 to adjust their equivalent displacement (i.e. a 1.3L rotary from a Mazda RX8 road car is deemed the same as a 1.95L piston engine, which would carry a 535kg min. weight). Personally, I would like to see something like the Group CN cars adapted to run in multi-class endurance racing, perhaps even the Le Mans 24. A CN chassis with engine costs about one-half that of an LMP2 chassis without the engine.

Not so long ago what the ACO now call LMP2 evolved from LMP 675, which as the name implies had a minimum weight of 675 kilograms (LMP2 currently has a 900kg min.). These lightweight cars were fast but fragile, but evolved to the point that they could compete for overall wins even with a smaller, less powerful engine than their LMP1 bretheren (i.e. the LMP2 Porsche RS Spyder won overall at the Sebring 12-hour in 2008). By that time the minimum weight was up to 825kg. Now the ACO have changed the LMP2 rules into a cost-capped, pro-am driver, production-based engine class with the same weight min. as an LMP1 car. The lightweight formula has been lost. A CN-based class couldn't compete against even the LMP2 class at present; but perhaps they too could evolve. Here are some sample lap times:

The Deltawing is a demonstration of  a lightweight (500kg), fast ( 3:42.612 Le Mans lap time) and efficient (half the fuel, half the tires) car that might, in future, be allowed to evolve and compete for overall wins. The new direction that the ACO has taken, toward efficiency (they are going to a fuel-flow formula for LMP1 in 2014), is right in the Deltawing's wheel-house. I am not in love with the Deltawing's looks, but form should follow function so I can accept it's appearance. I could hope that there are more pleasing shapes that would be sufficiently slippery to contribute to speed and efficiency. I see hybrid cars, such as those mandated by the ACO for factory LMP1 teams in 2014, as a merely a transitional strategy for energy efficiency. Hybrids should not be the only technology allowed the showcase of Le Mans competition. I am curious about the new Mazda "SKYACTIV-D" turbo diesel that should debut in both ALMS LMP2 and Grand-Am GX classes in 2013. Imagine such an engine in a modified CN-based chassis of less than 600kg. The bottom line is: there should be a light, fast and efficient class that can compete for overall wins at Le Mans. Well, I can dream can't I?

Rules? Which Rules?

One of the major tasks facing the  ALMS and Grand-Am officials over the next year will be to come up with a set of rules and regulations that will allow teams from both series to compete. I am thankful it is not my task to do so. Let's just look at one fundamental piece of this rule-making task: pit stops.

Under Grand-Am rules, the pit stops are pretty simple and straight-forward. First let's look at the allowed pit personnel:

Other than drivers and "industry representatives", only 6 people are allowed in the pits during a stop. In a full-service stop (includes tire change), the car comes into the pits, goes up on jacks, fuel goes in, the tires are changed while fueling, the jacks come down and the car merges back onto the pit lane. Done. The engine may remain running and the mechanics can push (or push-start) the car.

Now lets look at the ALMS pit-stop. The ALMS follows the ACO rules for pit stops. As before let's see who is allowed in the pits during a full-service stop:

This pit stop is not simple. There are three phases to each full-service pit stop: Refueling, wheel changing, and repair. There are strict rules governing the personnel in each phase and what they can and cannot do. So, the car comes into the pit, the engine is shut off, refueling begins and other than changing memory cards, cleaning windshields, changing water bottles and drivers, no other work can go on and the car must remain on the ground. Tire and brake technicians may inspect those parts, but not work on them. Once the refueling has been completed, then the car can go up on jacks, the wheels may be changed and repairs can be made. Once the work is completed, the car comes off the jacks and must re-start under it's own power. The car may not be pushed or push-started in the pits. BTW, the pit crew is allowed 2 wheel guns, but only one may be used at a time.

Imagine a race where one class uses the Grand-Am pit rules and another uses the ACO rules. There would be a huge advantage to the class using the Grand-Am rules. So what will the new unified series do about pit stops in 2014?

Currently the ALMS gets a number of "automatic" invitations to compete in the Le Mans 24, including: LMP1 class champion, LMP2 class champion, GTE (Pro and Am) class champions, Michelin Green-X Challenge champions in prototypes and GTE. In order to keep this relationship with the ACO, what will be required? What if keeping ACO pit regulations were part of those requirements?

Most of the justification for the elaborate pit-stops under ACO rules have to do with safety. Specifically the avoidance of fire in the pits. The engine is shut off to lessen possible ignition sources. The car remains on the ground so it can be moved in the event of a fire. Then there are rules that are related to the endurance of the car: the car must start under it's own power. Finally, the restriction of using only one air gun at a time was a recent addition to the rules, and was done to discourage frequent tire changes by requiring more time for each such change, for both economic reasons and to add another factor to team strategy.

In Grand-Am, they use spec tires and are limited in how many they may use at any event; this is how they control tire expense. After watching archived videos of this year's Rolex races, I get the distinct impression that ALMS prototypes get much better tire mileage than the Daytona prototypes. At Le Mans, Audi was able to quintuple-stint their Michelin tires. The difference is likely to be in the tire development by the tire manufacturers fostered by the open tire formula used in the ALMS. Technicians from Michelin, Dunlop, Falken, Pirelli and Yokohama work with the teams to provide better tires for nearly every race. So a simple rule change can have a large impact on am important aspect of endurance.

I don't envy the technical teams that have been charged with unifying the rules of ALMS and Grand-Am (they still need a name for this beast). Simpler may be less expensive (fewer personnel) and easier to police; simpler pit-stops are easier to follow and faster, but are they as safe? What is the relationship of the LMP and GTE classes to the ACO with regard to pit stop rules? I will have to wait for the answers like everyone else.

Two-Way Radio

I grew up in a time and place in which radio was a richly diverse medium. In Southern California in the 1960's and 1970's you could find radio stations playing any genre of music you can think of, plus dedicated sports stations, news stations, religious stations, talk stations etc. The DJ's were for the most part live on the air and controlled their own playlists. Since those times, radio has become a comparatively sterile pre-fabricated experience. The Internet has largely replaced radio with many richly diverse media outlets.

When I followed endurance racing as a kid in the 1960's, it was at a remove; there would be hourly reports during the Daytona 24, Sebring and Le Mans on one of the sports stations, I could read about preparations before the big events and after them in magazines like Road and Track, later there were highlights on ABC's "Wide World of Sports", but that was about it. Today I have many more ways to follow endurance racing.

In 2004 I went searching for ways to re-connect with my youthful enthusiasm for endurance racing and found Radio Le Mans (RLM, www.radiolemans.com) and simultaneously the American Le Mans Series (ALMS). With on-line timing and scoring and the commentary on RLM I had a much richer experience than I had in my youth. John Hindhaugh and his colleagues on RLM didn't just cover the race, they conveyed their knowledge, enthusiasm and humor to the listener. They are experienced fans with microphones and a gift for bringing the races to life for their listeners. In addition to race coverage, RLM has a weekly 2-hour show called "Mid-Week Motorsport" (MWM) on Wednesdays at 8:00PM London time. This "weekly window on motorsport ..." is ostensibly a news show, but it is, to say the least, informal and not like any other such show that I know of. The adjectives that come to mind that describe MWM are "informal", "quirky" and "personal". MWM comes across as a get-together of friends at a pub with a common interest in motor sport. This impression is strengthened by including real-time listener comments from RLM's on-line forum into the show.

The same richly diverse media provided by the Internet that brings me my race coverage allows RLM to become much more than news and commentary, they are interactive. Even before the RLM forum went on line, email from listeners was encouraged and sometimes read out live during race coverage and on MWM. RLM now use Twitter and Facebook along with email and their on-line forum to extend what comes to seem like a conversation with listeners to their coverage. Their audience is International, and thanks to the Internet, available wherever English is understood. We are a community, a "tribe", referred to as the "Mid-Week Motosrport Listeners Collective", or just "the collective".

Elsewhere I have described how I would rather have RLM audio commentary with live timing and scoring of entire races, than mundane commentary of race highlights on TV or video. Up until the 2011 season, RLM covered all the ALMS races live and in their entirety. That year the ALMS decided to take their coverage "in-house" and RLM was no longer permitted to cover their races. At least the ALMS and ESPN kept part of the RLM team (John Hindhaugh and Jeremy Shaw) on as commentators for the International audience, but some of the informal and interactive qualities found in RLM coverage were lost, even as quality video was added. Those qualities are still found in RLM's coverage of the WEC and other series they cover. In my opinion, the ALMS is missing the opportunity to fully connect with the RLM "tribe".

While watching "Top Gear" on BBC America, Clarkson, Hammond and May were participating in an endurance race in a BMW. When they wanted the suggestion of Le Mans conveyed to the audience, they had the Radio Le Mans theme song, the instrumental intro to "She Sells Sanctuary" by The Cult, on the soundtrack. RLM is strongly identified with endurance racing in general and Le Mans in particular. To me and I assume many others, RLM is part of endurance racing in a way that is hard to express.

No time to explain, get in the Llama. Drink! :-}

The Media are the Messengers: Coverage of Endurance Racing

Living on a Caribbean island may seem idyllic, but trust me, not everything is heavenly in "America's Paradise". For one thing this island is isolated from motor sport. The logistics and expense of actually attending a race makes media coverage of vital importance to me.

On paper the ALMS media coverage is impressive: Live video streaming, network TV coverage, and on-line video archives of all the races.  Live timing and scoring completes the coverage. The execution of those coverage options leaves something to be desired however. The TV coverage is not of the entire race; you get edited highlights of some fraction of the race. The video streaming is split into two parts: one for domestic U.S. viewers that happen to be allowed to access the espn3.com website (your ISP has to be on an approved list); the other part is for International viewers (those outside the U.S.). So, even though I am in the U.S. Virgin Islands and my cable TV subscription includes ESPN, my ISP is not on the approved list. Luckily I am considered "International" and can get that coverage from the ALMS web site. As a plus, the International coverage utilizes the talents of John Hindhaugh and Jeremy Shaw, regulars of the Radio Le Mans (RLM) coverage team.

Highlight coverage is a compromise between coverage of the entire race and the difficulty of scheduling a long sporting event in a busy TV schedule. While many anoraks might well prefer to watch the entire 12 hours of Sebring than spend an entire Sunday watching football, we are in the minority and have to accept that a general purpose sports network will not be able to accommodate us. Prior to the start of this season's ALMS coverage, it was suggested that the highlights package would be edited into story lines resembling the documentary "Truth in 24", about Audi's 2008 Le Mans campaign. I was skeptical that such a thing would be possible with such a short space of time between the race and the next week's (let alone the next day's) TV coverage. I was justified in my skepticism, it turned out to be a not-so-exciting highlights package after all. It may be suitable for the casual TV viewer, but for endurance racing enthusiasts it is disappointing.

The streaming video coverage is of the entire race, which is great. Unfortunately there have been some  technical problems with the live delivery of those streams. So far four of this season's races: Lime Rock, Mosport, Mid-Ohio, and Road America had severe problems, at least for the International coverage.

The Lime Rock and Mosport streams had partial live TV coverage of the second half of those 2hr 45min races. The ESPN TV coverage used Brian Till and Johnny O'Connell in the announcer's booth. Those of us following the International video stream were startled and disappointed when halfway through the race the audio went briefly silent, and when it returned we heard, not John Hindhaugh and Jeremy Shaw, but Brian Till and Johnny O'Connell. I don't have anything derogatory to say about Brian and Johnny, but I and many other fans have followed ACO-rules endurance racing for years with Radiolemans.com and other voices are just not the same. I think that the reason for the two announcer teams and with the bifurcated coverage in the first place had to do with broadcast rights. So this faux pas was definitely not intentional. BTW, the archived video stream had the "correct" International audio track for it's entire length. The Mid-Ohio coverage on the International stream was a complete failure. The ALMS web site crashed, and no one could start the coverage thereafter. After that experience, I subscribed to the ESPN Player (www.espnplayer.com): $6.99 for all the ALMS races. This is a great bargain and had none of the problems experienced with the ALMS International stream, according to the participants on the Radiolemans.com forum. I was unable to follow the Road America race due to the fact I was on an airplane much of that day, but according to the RLM forum participants, the International stream was another washout,  a badly buffering, stuttering mess.

Through all of the problems with the ALMS stream, the ESPN stream (both espn3.com and espnplayer.com) were rock solid according to reports on the RLM forum. Those of us that listen to Midweek Motorsport on radiolemans.com were assured that the problems were not at the track and that neither the ALMS personnel nor ESPN personnel were responsible for the problems. The archived videos of the race coverage were immaculate. This places the problems "down stream" from the source.

I was dreading another dismal performance for the Baltimore race, but this time I was prepared, I had an ESPN Player subscription. I was most pleasantly surprised when both qualifying and the race were flawless on the ALMS International stream. In fact, it was better than the ESPN Player (higher sustained bit rate, no buffering at all). I noticed that the ALMS had a new Flash player, and further investigation showed that they apparently changed Content Delivery Network (CDN) providers; they were now using Level 3, the same as ESPN. This last week's race at VIR was also rock-solid and this time they were using Akamai as their CDN. I was so relieved. The ALMS should be congratulated for recognizing the problems and fixing them, but why did they have to punt 40% of their live race coverage (for those of us dependent on the Internet anyway)?

Now I come to the heart of my message: What will happen with coverage of ALMS/Grand-Am in 2014? The timing of the merger of the ALMS and Grand-Am was in part determined by current media coverage contracts, so 2013 will probably be the same as this year. The merged series should be in a better position to negotiate coverage with the various media outlets. My personal fear is that coverage will go to the NASCAR owned Speed TV and Speedtv.com. This is not a bad thing for most fans; for many years the ALMS was covered by Speed TV. For me that would be a big problem. My local cable TV monopoly does not carry Speed TV and I am geoblocked from seeing any video on Speedtv.com. My home is situated such that satellite TV is not possible. Because the only live coverage of the Grand-Am series has been on Speed TV, the only way I can watch those races is after the fact, utilizing the archived video on the Grand-Am web site. Those living in Europe and elsewhere will probably have some International coverage, but I am stuck. Living on this island has it's problems.

For years I followed (audio only) the ALMS, ELMS and Le Mans on radiolemans.com with timing and scoring from the race organizers. With the current ESPN/ABC arrangement, radiolemans.com is no longer permitted to cover the ALMS races. At least ESPN and ALMS put the voices from RLM on their International coverage and on the archived videos.

When the 2014 media contracts are signed, here is what I hope is included in the package, no matter who the TV contract/s is/are with:

- A non-geoblocked, live streaming video feed of the entire race.
- Broadcast Network coverage of at least some of the races
- Solid International TV coverage outside the U.S.
- Radiolemans.com coverage.
- Comprehensive Timing and Scoring over the web.
- On-demand streaming video archives of all races and qualifying

The timing and scoring on the ALMS web site used to have more information, including running pit stop elapsed time and time of last stop. I would also like to see sector times as long as I'm dreaming. In the current coverage arrangement there is no "audio-only" option. When you select live audio, you get another video stream. In low bandwidth situations that won't work. It would also allow an alternate sound track for the video feed. A true "audio-only" option with rich timing and scoring is better, in my opinion, than partial, or broken video coverage. Make the audio-only option Radiolemans.com and I would be happy. I would gladly pay a nominal sum for quality live video streaming, like the ESPN Player's $6.99 per season, if I can't get it for free.

So Many Tracks, So Little Time

As a fan who follows endurance sports car racing almost exclusively on-line, I would like to see as many races as possible. After all if you follow racing on TV or via the Internet, you don't have the expense of travel and your logistics are pretty simple. For the participating race teams, the number of races and where they are held present a much larger budgetary and logistical problem. For teams competing in the proposed ALMS/Grand-Am unified series (it really needs a name, I'll call it ALMS-GA for now), the choices of venue are wide but the constraints of budget, time, and conflicting calendars will limit the number of races that can realistically be run in a season.

At the merger press conference the ALMS-GA folks stated that they are shooting for a 12-race schedule for 2014. They further suggested that championship points would be calculated on the best 11 of the 12 races to allow teams to prepare for Le Mans without penalty if they wished.  In creating a 2014 schedule for the ALMS-GA one would have to be aware of each track's schedule/availability, the weather at the venue for the time of the proposed events, possible conflicting events, and keep in mind the travel and logistical realities of getting the teams to the venues, with breaks for repairs and development taken into consideration. I'm glad it isn't my job to juggle all these factors.

January 2014 is a bit more than 15 months away, so part of the scheduling process is guesswork because many potential conflicting events are yet unknown. Traditionally the ALMS, ELMS, and ACO attempted to avoid overlapping events to allow teams the option of competing in any of the events (except this year, with the WEC). No 2014 series schedule exists yet, we only know that Le Mans is usually held around the summer solstice (third week of June).

So, for the time being let's just concentrate on the "where" first. In 2012, combining the ALMS and Grand-Am, races will take place on 18 different tracks. Additionally there are 4 venues that have either been included by one series of the other, or been considered for inclusion. That is 22 venues. Somehow the ALMS-GA will have to select 12. There are some hard choices to be made. From the 2012 schedules of the ALMS and Grand-Am let's see where they go. First there are 4 tracks that were visited by both series:

I have included the 2012 event dates in the table to show possible openings at each track for scheduling purposes. Since both series chose to run there and these are some of the best natural-terrain road courses on the continent, these would likely be included in the new schedule.

Next, we have the signature events for each series:

In the cases of the Daytona 24hr. and the Sebring 12hr. they have a history in sports car racing that pre-dates both ALMS and Grand-Am; those two events were the traditional beginning of the endurance racing season and previous world championships; Daytona in January and Sebring in March. Those two events are currently also the single largest draw for their respective series. In recent years Watkins Glen has been featured in the Grand-Am's endurance championship (along with Daytona and new this year, Indianapolis), while Petit Le Mans is the traditional season-ending event and one of the largest draws (along with Sebring and Long Beach) in the ALMS.

Then we have what I will call the "market-driven" events:

These events are all street circuits located near large population centers. They are important in raising the profile of their respective series and in attracting new fans, sponsors, and media coverage. They are also nicely spread out geographically.

So, if the ALMS-GA were to include just these 3 categories unchanged, they would already be up to 11 events. If they were adamantly committed to a 12-race schedule, there is only 1 further venue include. Let's look next at the venues that are unique to each series in 2012:

A tough choice isn't it? Personally if I had only 1 choice from this list, I would choose Mosport. But I have a suggestion that would ease the pain somewhat: allow teams to drop 2 races from championship calculations and go with a 14 or 15 race schedule. Some tough choices would still need to be made, but that way both Canadian races (Mosport and Montreal) and Indianapolis could potentially be included (for example).

There is at least one further category of venue to consider when creating a schedule: tracks that have been utilized in the past, or are under consideration for 2013:

The Circuit of the Americas (COTA) is still under construction, but the WEC is likely to hold it's North American round there in 2013, possibly as a double-header with the ALMS. St. Petersberg is a street circuit that the ALMS has run on in the past. Miller Motorsport Park in Utah is the longest natural-terrain road course on the continent (and one of the newest) that has also been used in the past. Sonoma is in an important market area and has recently received some upgrades.

So, here are my picks for the venues for the ALMS-GA 2014 season in chronological order:

1. Daytona 24hr. (late January)
2. Sebring 12hr. (early March)
3. Long Beach (2hrs. early April)
4. Laguna Seca (6hrs. early May)
5. Belle Isle (2hrs. 1st week in June)
6. Watkins Glen (6hrs. early July)
7. Mosport (2:45hrs. mid July)
8. Mid-Ohio (2:45hrs. early August)
9. Road America (4-6hrs. mid August)
10. Lime Rock (2:45hrs. early September)
11. Baltimore (2hrs. late September)
12. Petite Le Mans (10hrs. late October)

In addition, I would add at least 3 more and allow teams to drop 2 races for championship consideration to hold down costs and allow running at Le Mans:

2a. COTA (6hrs. late March when the weather is cool)
3a. Sonoma (2:45hrs. late April)
9a. Montreal (2:45hrs. late August)

The top 12 would include the 11 "core" races described above plus Mosport to keep some International flavor. My 3 added races include a second Canadian race and two western venues to help regionally balance the series. I would also like to add Miller Motorsport Park, but I had to draw the line somewhere. I tried to be realistic in my choices. My unfettered personal choices would not include "rovals", or street circuits (I don't like to see heavily damaged cars). Daytona and the street circuits are too important not to be included, but my list favors natural-terrain permanent road circuits.

My ALMS/Grand-Am Class Structure

The recent announcement of the merger of the American Le Mans Series (ALMS) with the Grand American Road Racing Series (Grand-Am ) beginning in 2014 was the event that has moved me to begin this blog. Endurance sports car racing has a long history, dating back to at least the first Le Mans 24-hour race in 1923. The core fan base of the sport (we are commonly known as "anoraks") are aware of this history and are generally quite knowledgeable about the cars, teams, drivers and venues of the sport. So, when a major change to "my" sport occurs, such as this merger, I am concerned that nothing is done to damage it. Since I have no real voice in the matter, I feel the need to put my opinions on the record somehow, hence this blog.

Presently (Sept. 2012) the ALMS has 5 separate classes of cars competing at the same time: LMP1, LMP2, GT (herein referred to as GTE to distinguish it from Grand-Am GT), LMPC, and GTC. Grand-Am has two classes: DP, and GT. In addition, Grand-Am has previously announced a new GX class for next year and at the merger press conference it was stated that the Deltawing was to be included in some way. That is too many classes. Obviously, things will have to change come 2014.

It has been suggested that LMP2 and DP be combined in a single class and that GTE and GT be similarly combined, then the performance be adjusted on the cars within each class. That would be a total mess and not easily done. The reason that different classes of race car exist is to provide rules for a level playing field: cars adhere to a common rule-set guiding their construction. Creating a combined class where the rules guiding construction are bifurcated is unfair and ill-advised. The common methods of “Balance of Performance” (BoP) (weight, intake restrictors, RPM limits) were intended for within-class BoP, not to balance separate classes, which LMP2 and DP certainly are. It would be unfair to have the DP compete against the faster LMP2 cars. An overweight, strangled LMP2 would not be very exciting. A pumped-up DP would still have major aerodynamic disadvantages to overcome. I propose to keep them separated into their own classes and perhaps evolve them into a single class in the future.

At the press conference announcing the merger it was stated that one priority was to keep a relationship to the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO, the sanctioning body of the 24 Hours of Le Mans) and a pathway to the Le Mans 24 open, at least for some classes. Another priority was to leave the highly competitive GTE (and ACO compliant) class largely as it is. If the new combined series organizers are serious about this, then it would not make sense to change the rules that allow that pathway for the LMP2 and GTE cars. This would also argue against combining GTE with GT as any BoP impacting the GTE cars would likely either make them non-compliant with ACO regulations or place and undue burden on the GT cars. The argument for keeping these classes separate is the same as the case for keeping LMP2 and DP separate: classes are there for a reason, you can't just throw BoP at them; it would endanger good-will among the teams and piss off the core fan base. Each class is in it's own race, let it go at that.

LMP1, the top class in the ALMS, WEC and Le Mans, is really only for factory teams. The ACO has deliberately structured it that way. Unless and until things change (factories sponsor multiple teams, rules change etc.) it doesn't seem to make any sense to keep them in this new series. Much as I love these cars, they just don't make much sense for privateers under the rules proposed for 2014, although both Porsche and Honda have expressed interest in producing cars for those rules along with Audi and Toyota. LMP1 car counts in the ALMS have fallen drastically (only two teams, three cars, as of this writing) since the current rules went into effect in 2010. Unless there is sufficient interest by the participating teams, I would eliminate LMP1 from the North American grid; the WEC can remain their playground. My hope is that someday LMP1 will return to North America.

The LMPC and GTC classes in the ALMS are recent additions to boost car counts. Both classes include spec cars and spec tires. They are viewed as developmental classes for prototype and GT class racing respectively. They have provided exciting racing and have served their purposes, but something has to give. To make room on the grid for the expanded North American series (I do wish it had a name), I would eliminate both of these classes or move them into a support series.

Here is my proposed preliminary class structure for 2014:

Le Mans Prototype: This class would track the LMP2 regulations as defined by the ACO to retain eligibility to run in the Le Mans 24 and the World Endurance Championship (WEC). This class would keep its Pro-Am driver restriction and open tire formula.

Daytona Prototype: Since this class is currently only supported in Grand-Am racing, it can evolve any way the sanctioning body wishes. Currently this class utilizes a spec tire from Continental.

Le Mans Grand Touring: This class would track the GTE regulations as defined by the ACO to retain eligibility to run in the Le Mans 24 and WEC. This class would keep an open tire formula.

Daytona Grand Touring: This class would include the current Grand-Am GT cars. While it currently includes both modified production cars and tube-frame silhouette cars, the class is unique to this series and uses a spec tire. It could evolve in any way the sanctioning body chooses.

The Deltawing is a single car and doesn't fit in any existing class. The GX class is currently undefined; the only particular known facts are that Mazda will supply their Skyactiv Diesel engine for it and  that Mazda will also supply that engine for the 2013 ALMS LMP2 campaign with Dempsey Racing. I'll pass on categorizing GX and the Deltawing for now, although I do have some ideas on those subjects.

Tires are often the single most important performance variable on any race car. The suspension and chassis are tuned to work with a particular tire or set of tires. Beyond performance, tire company sponsorship is a very important source of funding. Using a “spec” tire deprives teams of sponsorship opportunities. It can actually increase costs for a team that would otherwise be sponsored by a tire company. If a team aspires to race at Le Mans or in the WEC, they need to be as competitive as possible and car development is greatly dependent on their tires. Cars in development benefit greatly from collaboration with tire engineers that provide feedback to tire manufacture. For these reasons the Le Mans eligible classes should keep their open tire formula.

Beyond 2014 rules can change and the classes could evolve to further simplify the class structure. The GT class could become a more formal FIA GT3 class for example. There is some pull in that direction already. The teams currently running DP cars  may decide that they might be interested in Le Mans and switch to LMP2 machinery. There is some evidence that it costs less to run a cost-capped LMP2 car than a third generation DP car. The classes that run today should change over time; this first cut at merging two different series should take into account that racing is ever evolving, nothing remains static for too long.