8-17-2003 - Fran Am 1600 race - Dijon France

Saturday Aug 9-2003 - After the 9 hour flight from Houston we got the rent car at the Charles de Gaulle airport and drove to the center of Paris.

We are staying at the Marriott on the famous Champs Elysees.

At the north end of the Champs Elysees is this monument many people have seen when Lance Armstrong completed his winning rides in the Tour de France.  It is the Arc de Triomphe.

We were crossing the street on the way to see the Eiffel Tower at night.

This area of Paris is very busy and active this Saturday night.  The stores are open until midnight and many restaurants open until 2:00am.

We made the 15 minute walk to the Eiffel Tower.  Paris has been under a massive heat wave with day time temps over 100 deg F. 

This is unusual for Paris and the people are melting.  For us West Texans it is not so bad.  The cool evening was great for all in Paris and the tower was packed with over 1 hour wait to get an elevator up.  Then the top level was closed due to over crowding.

We decided to look around and enjoy the sights.  You can see why they call Paris the "City of Lights".

We have Sunday and Monday for more touring of Paris.

Now we plan to try to get our human clocks on French time.

Good night.

Sunday August 10 - 2003 - We got some good rest and headed out on the town to see what we could.

More Paris facts follow - This is the Seine river that runs through Paris.  There are many boats that travel the river taking people past the sights.

Today it was another scorcher, upper 90's.  The guys making out were the street venders selling frozen bottled water.  2 euro ($2.50) a bottle and selling like mad.

We walked to the Eiffel Tower to try to get to the top.  Well the line for the elevator was again packed.  So we bought a ticket for the stairs.  We than walked up 685 steps (Travis counted) to the second floor (about 1/3 the way to the top). 

The view from here was fantastic.  You can see the Arc de Triomphe in the center of the picture. 

We made our way back to the Arc de Triomphe - consuming 2 frozen waters each on the way.

Next was what could be the most dangerous part of the trip.  Crossing 5 lanes of traffic on the circle around the Arch.  We made it to the center of the circle and to the top of the Arch.  Napoleon 1 built the monument to commemorate the military exploits of France under the Revolution and the First Empire.

We got back to the room in time to watch the CART race from Mid Ohio on Euro Sport.

Monday August 11 - 2003 - Well the last day of Paris sight seeing.  Here is the famous Louvre Museum.  It is quite a place with tons, and tons.....and tons...and more tons of paintings and statues.

I have to say that after about 1 hour we saw enough paintings and statues for a life time.

The building was cool, and impressive.  What was the most interesting thing about the statues was how they made them with that kind of detail so long ago.  Looks like to us it would require a good CAD machine and rapid prototyping system.

So here is your art history lesson for the trip.  This is Venus de Milo.  A lady with no arms.  Not as bad as most statues in the Louvre as they had no heads or arms.

This was one of the dumpiest paintings in the place.

Famous for sure but it had no color compared to many.

So after 2 hours on the Louvre we headed to the modern part of town, La Defense.

This is about 3 miles from the Arc de Triomphe.

It has a modern shopping mall, and the big office buildings of Paris.

We took the Metro around town.  It is a very nice system, clean and well lit.

This now ends your obligatory tour of Paris culture.  In the morning we are off to Dijon.

Tuesday August 12 - 2003 - Today we drove from Paris to Dijon.  Dijon is about 180 miles southeast of Paris.

As we left Paris the countryside started to get rolling and wooded.  By the time we arrived in Dijon it looked like we were pulling into Watkins Glen in upstate NY.

The French highway system is very good with almost no speed limit (we went 130 to 140 KM/hour most of the time - 80 to 85 MPH, with our mini van).

We found the motel easy from the Dijon center.

The motel is on the north side of Dijon and is attached to a huge shopping mall.  This place is something, with a normal USA size mall and a Wal-Mart superstore type place attached.

Then there is a small water park with slides and a wave pool attached as well.

There are about 10 restaurants in the mall as well.  Colin and Travis hit the water park for a few hours.

Here is a shot of Dijon from the motel.

In the morning we plan to find the track and then visit the Stand 21 factory.

We can meet the team at 6:00 pm at the track when it opens for rig parking.

Wednesday August 13 - 2003

We started the day with a trip to the Stand 21 factory near Dijon.

Colin is sponsored by Stand 21 for his safety gear.  We feel that it is the best gear in the world.  Not because of the sponsorship but because it IS the best.  He would be in Stand 21 gear no matter what.

We got to see the production, shipping, and sales department today.  It is a small company and this is a good point.  Most suits are special made to fit the drivers.  They are hand sewn and produced.

Here is the factory entrance and one of the support vans.

We continued on the road from Stand 21 to the track, about 5 miles away.

This track was used for the F1 GP for a time and is used now for National and regional races.

We did get a chance to see the track.  It looks very fast and smooth.  There are some big elevation changes as well.

The track looks narrow in spots, but the curbs are very nice.

Colin has thousands of laps around the track on the Play Station game but it is bound to be a different view from his car Tomorrow.

We could not resist a trip to the kart track.  It is right across from the main straight of the big track.

What a place!  There is a new huge grand stand with balcony, full service restaurant, and game room.

Below the restaurant is a full kart shop.  The track is fully lit for night racing. 

The surface is great with perfect curbs.  Some day someone will build a kart track like this in the USA, but as of now nothing comes close.

Almost made Colin wish he was still karting.  But then..............................................

The cars showed up and that thought left!

Here is Colin's car in the foreground.  The team had most of the driver fitting items done like peddle position set.

We spent some time working on the seat, steering wheel, and driver position.

For the morning we have to pour a custom molded seat for the upper 1/2 of his body.

Practice starts at 9:00 am.  Colin will have 2 teammates.  Maxime Hodencq, the driver that will be coming to Thunderhill to team with Colin in September, and Jérôme D'ambrosio.  Jerome is a top FA kart racer and winner of the World Cup last year.

There are some fast guys here.  Astromega has a team.  They are a top running team in the F3000 series, and Tomcat Team showed up from the Italian championship.  Thursday is the first day of practice.

Thursday August 14 - 2003

 Colin got his first laps in the car and at Dijon starting at 9:00 a.m.  All 3 TBR cars hit the track with Colin being the only one new to the track.

The car felt good and had no problems during the first 5 lap session.  In the next session Colin lost braking power and came to the pits.

The front brake pads were completely worn down to the back plates and the team had to change the pads and rotors.

More laps and Colin was almost 4 seconds off the fast guys.

He loved the track (fast and very smooth).  Colin kept working on his driving and the times got to within 3 seconds.

The engine was sounding flat and without power all morning, but we kept working on the driving and the chassis set up, making small gains.

After a very hard thunderstorm and the lunch break Colin had 3 hours left.

The engine was no better, and with no data system on Colin's car we were unable to compare Colin's engine to Max or Jerome.

Segment times showed Colin as quick as the fast guys in the turns, but unable to stay close on the straights.

Working with rake and wing angles as well as the anti-roll bars made the car have good confidence in the fast turns of Dijon.

In the end Colin was a full 2 seconds off the fast guys.

The engine rebuilder from France listened to the engine at the end of the day and told the crew to shut it off it was broken!

There is no spare engine for Colin so we hope to take the head off and work on the valves in the morning before qualifying.

Here Max (on left), Jerome (center), and Colin clean the body work of their cars - a team rule.

At the end of the day the 2 cars are put on stands and prepared for the next day running.

We hope that the engine can be fixed, if not it is going to be a VERY long weekend for Colin.

But Colin is just driving the car as hard as he can and working in the manner that he has learned from the Speed Secrets Camps and practiced doing for the past 2 years.

It looks to be working.  Qualifying is Friday.

Friday August 15 - 2003

The Renault engine people worked for 3 hours in the morning to find the problem with Colin's engine. 

They replaced 6 of the 8 lifters and the engine sounded better when started up.

Here Colin is strapped in by his mechanic, Vince, for qualifying session #1. 

It only took 3 laps to see that the engine was no better.  Colin ran quicker than he did yesterday but only because he had new tires.

It was a lost cause and he qualified in last place.

We tried to change some parts on the engine before the second qualifying session.

Well as the picture shows it was raining for this session, so we did not get a chance to try the engine.

The Renault engine guy came to take a look and said that it was not right.

He checked a few things and said that there was no choice but to change it.  Now the problem of getting a spare.

Eric van de Poele and Dominic Hodencq (Dad of Max), were able to arrange for a new rebuilt engine for Colin.

The team set to work and will change the engine in time for the race at 10:45 am on Saturday.

Colin is here with his new engine and the signature hat of Eric van de Poele.

Starting in 11th place  will not be easy.  There is no warm up so Colin will have to go straight into the race with no check on the engine.

The results of the Saturday race determine the start of the Sunday race.  They invert the top 6 for Sunday, so if Colin can get to 6th on Saturday he can start on pole position.

A very tall order against these drivers, but something to work for. 

We want to say a special tanks to Dominic for providing the engine for Colin. 

Saturday August 16 - 2003

Albert and the TBR crew did a great job changing the engine in the car last night.

In the morning we put it on the set up pad and were looking forward to the race.

Here Colin and Max are in the cars ready for the formation lap. 

After the formation lap the cars stop on the grid for 15 minutes. 

Here Vince and Colin wait for the start of the grid lap.

Colin took up his 11th (last) grid spot and was ready for the standing start.

His start was good but ahead of him it was 3 cars wide.

Big surprise in turn one - he had a massive understeer.

Not much got better as the race went on.  Colin made a few spots when some drivers went off and crashed, but the push was so bad he was fighting tire lock up into most turns.

In the end he went from 11th to 7th.  It was hard to tell if the engine was better due to the slow exit speed from the push.

We had some possible ideas on what caused such a big push but spent 3 hours on the set up pad without finding anything major wrong with the car.

Here Colin is in the car on the pad.  We changed a few things, but resisted the urge to change many things for fear of going to far.

We get no warm up session each day - straight into the race, so it is a gamble on the set up.

We have little to lose at this point, so we took a bit of a risk.

Jerome was 2nd and Max crashed out of 5th with a few laps to go.

The race was won by Craig Dolby from England.  Colin and Craig raced each other in Parma Italy in 2001 in karts.

We hope for a better race on Sunday.  It is very nice to have Eric van de Poele here helping Colin.  Eric is a world class driver and he is helping Colin learn the sport he loves.  Colin and our family are lucky to have friends like Eric.

Sunday August 16 - 2003

Here is a shot of Colin and Travis with Nicholas van de Poele.  He is the son of Eric and spent the weekend with the team.

Nicholas is a nice young man with a bit of his dad's wild side.  He spent hours on the engine powered go ped scaring many in pit lane with his speed and daring.

Nicholas also likes to read Harry Potter so Travis spent quite a bit of time discussing the fine points of the new book with him.

After all the time on the set up pad yesterday we knew we had the car set up well and were ready for the race to finally get to drive the car hard.

Here Vince straps Colin in as Max gets the same treatment before the race start.

Colin did the grid lap but it is at a slow pace and he could not tell if the car was better.

Below is the starting line up with Colin the 4th car on the far row.

On the start Colin crept forward quite a bit.  All of these cars creep when the clutch is in due to the kind of clutch they have, but Colin went to far and was out of his box.

He got a good start and was in 7th into the first turn.  Than another big surprise - the understeer was the same!

After the safety car came back out for a stranded car, they gave Colin a stop and go penalty for creeping on the  start.  He entered the pits and we stopped him and put the front wings to max angle and lowered the front tire pressures.

2 laps later he was back in as we found out it is not legal to make any changes to the car under the stop and go.  The changes did not help at all!  This was unbelievable.  These were desperate changes and should have made the car go to oversteer.

So Colin stopped again as we had nothing to lose and we wanted to learn something.  We went to full soft on the front roll washers and this made a 5% improvement.

In the end Colin said that he had the wheel turned so much in 2 turns on the lap that the rack hit the rack stop each time (maximum lock).

The team plans to take apart the car to find the problem.  It is not a simple set up issue (Colin's car was set up to have LESS understeer than Max and Jerome).  It may be a broken engine mount, or a problem with a tire.  The TBR guys will find the answer for sure and let us know.

All the TBR guys put in a big effort for Colin and never gave up.  They had a driver complaining of a bad engine, than they replace that and the car will not handle like it did before the change but the power is good.  Many teams would have blamed it on the driver and given up.  Not these guys, they kept at it and worked right to the end - BIG THANKS!

Above is Eric van de Poele with Colin.  Colin is so lucky to have Eric helping.  Here is a driver that has raced in F1, and at the top of world class sports car racing.  Not many drivers starting out have men like Eric helping them. 

When you add Ross Bentley coaching Colin, I dare say there is no beginning driver in the world with this quality of help.

We wish we could have done better for Speed Secrets, Stand 21, Bell, and Coello Racing.  Race weekends like these happen, it was just to bad it happened in France at the time when so many people have worked so hard to make the race happen.  Dominic Hodencq has been so good and helpful to see that we had a good weekend.  He felt so bad when things did not go our way.  We just hope that we can provide Max an effort at Thunderhill like Dominic gave Colin.

In 3 weeks Colin will be back on the track at Thunderhill, CA with Max driving with him.  We all look forward to erasing this weekend from the results memory, but we will never erase it from the memories we will take of the friends we have made, and experiences we had.  All in all a "character building" weekend in a young driver's career.