Krohn Racing Six Hours of the Glen Race review 06.06.2010: The Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen race proved to be eventful for Krohn Racing. Team owner/driver Tracy W. Krohn started the race from the 11th position on the grid. After six hours of racing with just four cautions for 17 laps, the No. 75 Krohn Racing Fo

The Sahlen’s Six Hours of the Glen race proved to be eventful for Krohn Racing. Team owner/driver Tracy W. Krohn started the race from the 11th position on the grid. After six hours of racing with just four cautions for 17 laps, the No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola finished in the same position.

A couple of on-track incidents and a questionable penalty put the team down four laps from the eventual winner, the No. 01 TELMEX/Chip Ganassi BMW Riley of Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas, the current GRAND-AM points leader. The first seven cars were on the lead lap 191.

A major car fire in the last hour caused the final caution, as the Krohn Racing crew members helped extinguish the No. 6 Ford Riley of Michael Shank Racing after it nursed its way to the pit entrance.



DRIVER QUOTES:

TRACY W. KROHN, Team Owner/Driver No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola:

“Overall, it was an interesting race to start with. My first stint had a lot of drama with the weather and everything. Nic did a spectacular job out there today. We had a little bit of bad luck. It looks like a blown call by Race Control. It cost us another lap. I think we would have finished in the Top 10. But nonetheless it was a good day for the car, good day for the crew.

Everything went pretty well. I can’t really complain. I had an incident with the 99 car wrecking into our car. It looks like I got hit just behind the driver’s door so I’m hard pressed to think that was a legitimate pass on the inside. But, oh well, that’s racing.

This is a great race to have just before Le Mans because it gets everybody tuned up and ready. I know I’m ready. I got a lot of time in the car today. I had over three hours in the car today so I’m very pleased with that. I know Nic is ready too. He put on a pretty good show with the car in his last stint there. I know he’s got to be real pleased with that.

And finally, the crew was just right on top of everything today. We had a little problem with the first pit stop. For some reason the car was spinning wheels. I’m not quite sure why. When they got it up on the jack it started spinning wheels. We lost another lap because of that. It was just one of those days.

 From here it’s a nice flight to Le Mans, France this evening. About 10 hours from now we’ll be in Le Mans.”


NIC JONSSON, Driver, No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola:

“The goal was to come home and get some points. I think at this point of the season our focus is going to have to be to try to win the Truman Award for Tracy. I think we extended the lead in that a little bit today with a few points. That was a good thing. The car was good. No really big complaints. In the middle of the race I think we ran leader pace. Then we got punted, which was a little frustrating. Otherwise the team did a great job again. The Proto-Auto Lola ran great all day. We took some points and that’s what we’re here for.

We’re leaving for Le Mans right now here tonight. We’re very fortunate to get to fly with Tracy on his plane so there will be a lot of relaxing and good food on there on the way over. Tomorrow we have a day to relax. Monday is scrutineering and Tuesday is a driver briefing and autograph session. We don’t start running until mid-day on Wednesday.

We have a couple of three days to rest so I think it will be fine. We’re looking forward to the 24 Hours and to get back in the Ferrari and hopefully have a solid and good run over there.”



DAVID BROWN, Krohn Racing Team Manager and Engineer:

“We had an incident packed race from our point-of-view. Obviously in a six hour race the goal is to get close enough to the end so that you can race for position. We had a couple of incidents. We had contact with the 99 car, which punctured the right rear tire. That forced an unscheduled stop. We were hit from behind by the 8 car on a restart very late in the race. Fortunately it didn’t cause any damage but it caused us to go off-track and spin. It was 30 seconds sorting it all out before we could get going again with Nic was in the car.

 In our efforts to get a lap back about two-thirds of the way through the race we managed to incur a penalty for, we think, pitting into a closed pit. However, we don’t fully understand yet why we got the penalty. Because we are obliged to stop by the rules, we did and served our penalty and rejoined the race having therefore not regained the lap we attempted to regain. But we are going to review that ourselves to see if we can understand why we received that penalty.

Otherwise, our car was not as quick as the 01 car but still a front running car here. During the pit stops we did have a slight kerfuffle (problem) where the car got left in gear that caused some consternation for the mechanics doing the rear wheels because, of course, they were spinning and they couldn’t change them. So that delayed one of our pit stops. We’re not quite sure how but we think the driver may have knocked it into gear as he got out of the car. That was a bit lengthy of a stop then we intended. But otherwise the car ran very well. The mechanics did a great job. My hat’s off to the team for doing a professional job. We look forward very much to going to Mid-Ohio.”


Tracy and Nic flew directly from Watkins Glen after the race to Le Mans, France, where they will compete in 78th running of the 24 Hours of Le Mans race, June 12-13. Eric van de Poele will join them as the third co-driver in the No. 83 Risi-Krohn Ferrari 430 GTE.

The next GRAND-AM race for the Krohn Racing team of Tracy Krohn and Nic Jönsson will be at the EMCO Gears Classic presented by KeyBank race at the Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course in Lexington, Ohio, June 1 8-19. For more information, please see www.grand-am.com, www.krohnracing.net or www.speedtv.com.

Barbara J. Burns - photos Graham Smith

More photos on automobilsport.com under PHOTOS SLIDESHOWS and PHOTOS Ecards AMERICAN SERIES