3-2005 - Colin featured in Road & Track

By Joe Rusz, EDITOR-AT-LARGE

Road & Track April 2005

YOUTH MUST BE SERVED

WHEN EMERSON FITTIPALDI WON HIS FIRST Formula 1 World Championship in 1972, it created quite a stir in the world of Grand Prix racing. Unlike any previous Fl cham­pion, Emmo was only 25 years old, two years younger than Jochen Rindt, who won the title the year before; 18 years younger than Nino Farina, who won the first postwar GP crown in 1950; and 13 years younger than the legendary Juan Manuel Fangio, who won the first of his five GP champion­ships in 1951 at age 39.

But Fittipaldi was an anomaly and dur­ing the next 20 years, the average age of an Fl champ was 30—with the exception of Niki Lauda, who won his first world championship at 26. Then came Michael Schumacher, who was just 25 when he won the first of his seven Fl titles. Since Schumi’s win in 1994, the average age of Fl drivers and potential world champions has been dropping, and except for Damon Hill, the 1996 champ, and Mika Hakkinen, the 1998 and ‘99 winner, who were 36 and 30, respectively, at the time of their first title victory, Fl finds itself with a bum­per crop of twentysomethings waiting in the wings. The standouts: 23-year-old Fer­nando Alonso (at 22, the youngest driver ever to win an Fl race), 25-year-old Jenson Button and 24-year-old Kimi Räikkönen.

Meanwhile, back in the U.S.A., Jeff Gordon’s 1995 Winston Cup champi­onship win at age 24 was a precursor for title victories in other series by  young drivers, such as Sam Horn­ish, who won the 2001 IRL In­dyCar championship at 22, and Scott Dixon who at 23 became the 2003 IRL champ after leaving CART where he had earned the distinction of being the youngest diver ever to win a race in a ma­jor open-wheel series—in 2001 when he was only 20.

As a senior citizen who con­sidered himself fortunate to have a mere driver’s license at 16, I’d arch an eyebrow whenever one of these young whippersnappers appeared on the racing

scene. You see, my heroes have always been “mature” drivers like Fangio, Mario Andretti and Paul Newman who just did Daytona at 80 (you’re in my fantasy league, man). It’s not that I have anything against kids. It’s just that, until recently, I’ve wondered, “How much could teenyboppers possibly know about driving a serious racing car?”

Well, it turns out, quite a lot. Meet Team 16, one of the GT class entries in the 2005 Rolex 24 At Daytona. In case you haven’t figured it out, the team gets its name from the fact that three of its four drivers are 16 years old. Graduates of various open-wheel pro series (Fran-Am 1600, Star Mazda, Formula TR), drivers Cohn Braun, Brad Coleman and Adrian Carrio drove a 911 GT3 Cup car owned by 2003 Daytona winner Kevin Buckler, to a fine finish in the twice-round-the-clock enduro. Oh yeah, they had an old man on the team: 48-year-old Ross Bentley, founder of Speed Secrets Driver Develop­ment Services, who served as their coach and mentor. “Did they tell you,” Bentley asked, “that my age is their combined age?”

All joking aside, Ross spoke highly of his youthful co-drivers. “They’re all really talented guys. Sometimes it’s hard to imagine them being 16 years old. They’re so mature in the way they act. I only wish I was half that good when I was 16.”

Although the Team 16 drivers are ob­viously mature for their age, what’s re­freshing about them is that they still have that teenage enthusiasm for what they’re doing. “I used to sit in the stands at Day­tona, watching the cars go by,” said Braun, whose dad was a race engineer with Team Scandia, “so it was pretty cool to get the chance to drive there.”

By the way, Cohn, who started racing quarter midgets at 6, says his only goal is to make it as a paid, professional race driver. “Some guys want to be only an Fl driver or only a NASCAR driver. I want to be like the next Tony Stewart or Robby Gordon—one of those do-it-all, versatile race-car drivers who can get in any car and drive it real fast, real quick.”