Under the sunny skies of southern Florida on a warm and breezy afternoon, the Compass360 Racing team took my BMW Z3 to our best Grand Am Cup finish ever.
Although the forecast had called for rain throughout the weekend, we managed two full days of practice and race day in dry conditions. The Miami 250 is run at the Homestead race facility, about 30 minutes south of Miami's downtown area. Like Daytona it's an oval race course (used primarily for IRL and NASCAR events) with an infield road section; we dub these combined tracks "rovals". It's a lot smaller than Daytona, with a tight, twisty infield, and it suits our BMW better. By comparison, our lap times at Daytona were 02:18, and at Homestead they were 01:35.

The Miami 250 is unique during the season as the Grand Am Cup is the feature event of the weekend. Normally we run as a support race to the Rolex series, which means we have to split our practice time over the weekend with them. Not so at Homestead, and we had plenty of time to run the BMW and learn the track on Friday and Saturday before the Sunday race. Being new to the Z3, we were keen to test and tune our car.
Grand Am Cup races are usually 3 hours long, and feature two drivers per car. So we're always on the lookout for good co-drivers; this weekend, Steven Ablondi (hailing from Bethesda, Maryland) joined us. I couldn't have asked for a better partner for the race! Steven and I ran very similar lap times, and were both able to be consistent with the car throughout each of our practice sessions. After more than two hours each in the car over the two days, we felt pretty good for the race.

As at Daytona, my friends Ian McQuillan and Robert Lavigne joined me at this event. This time around, though, we ran the car as our own. Crew Chief Ian made sure the car was in good shape for each run, and Rob worked on race strategy and got our paperwork to Grand Am on time. This was a big change from Daytona, as this time we ran the Z3 separately from Matt Connolly's new 330i (which he shared with the talented Zach Arnold). Each car had its own Crew Chief (hats off to John Vincent on Matt's 330i), and we shared crew members and equipment, used the same pit and fuelling rig. This worked out really well, and we'll do the same for the next race, Phoenix in two weeks.

Now, it's no secret that as it sits, the Z3 is not the class of the field. It was substantially more competitive than it was at Daytona, but we still qualified at the blunt end of the field, 42nd out of 55 cars on the grid. But qualifying isn't all that important in Grand Am Cup racing, as it's endurance that counts throughout the three hours.

Steven started the race, and quickly found himself at the back of the pack, since most of the cars behind him were faster-class GS cars that had failed to qualify. Unfortunately, we discovered during the pace lap that his radio headset had become disconnected, which meant we couldn't communicate with him during the race. We couldn't contact him through pit boards, either, as you're not allowed to cross pit lane during the race. Steven demonstrated real professionalism though, and pitted at the first yellow flag, which came out early in the race. Because he was at the back of the field, stopping made no difference to our position as he was able to catch back up again before the green flag dropped. A really smart move on his part!

So back into the fray he went for a bunch more laps. At the next yellow, which fell around the 17th lap, we brought Steven in for a quick splash of fuel. Our hope was that we'd get another yellow around lap 60 or 70, which would allow us to refuel the car completely, change drivers, and run to the end. Other cars stayed out during this yellow, but they later had to come in during a green flag lap, which cost them much more time. After these two pit stops, we were still on the lead lap!

Steven continued to run consistent, solid laps for the next hour. One of the real keys to doing well in Grand Am Cup is to run at a pace the driver and car are comfortable with, allow the faster GS-class cars to pass without incident, and push hard but not use up the car and tires. The next yellow came out just a wee bit early, on lap 55, and we brought Matt and Zach's 330i in for fuel and driver change first, which was perfect for their strategy. We waited until the last minute to bring Steven in, which he did at lap 60. Unfortunately in the melee that is pit lane he missed our pit stall by a few feet and had to go back out again (you're not allowed to back up in pit lane!). The next lap he came in and we made a flawless pit stop, with me jumping into the car with a full load of fuel.

Most teams seemed to have pitted during this mid-race yellow and it meant that the "second" drivers were now in the cars. And so we had a great race on our hands. Steven had given me the car in good condition, although we find that our spec Hoosier tires get quite slippery after the first third of the race and they were a bit of a handful. I managed to drift my way through most corners on the track, only having a couple of stomach-in-throat moments where the car was really out of shape.

So the race continued and by hour two we'd managed to pass a number of our ST-class competitors including one of the beautiful new Mazda RX-8s, Acura Integras, RSXs, a Sentra SE-R and both of the Dodge SRT-4s. Towards the end of the race I had a really good dice with the #94 Integra of Moorcones and Piper, and it looked like a nail-biter right to the checkered flag. We'd swap positions every few laps, running nose-to-tail through the infield. Alas, a late race yellow flag was dropped, which ended our battle and caused the race to be finished under caution.

Happily, in the end we finished a remarkable 10th in class, and 19th overall out of 53 cars. The 10th in class is a personal best GAC finish for me, and is a really big deal as we finished ahead of a bunch of bigger-budget teams. Tenth place is also "in the money" meaning we get a part of the prize fund! Being paid means I can now say that I really am a "pro" race driver :-))

Really big thanks have to go to Ian, who I'm pretty sure tightened every nut on the Z3 at least twice, and made sure the car was good and reliable throughout the weekend. He never left a stone unturned. Rob was indispensable, working in the pit crew and thinking of everything Ian and I forgot. Steven, too, was a remarkable talent who not only drove the car hard for the race but brought it in with nary a mark on it. And he brought sponsors, too! Thanks to Terreal Tiles in Homestead for helping Steven to run with us.

In case you can't tell from the tone of this report, I'm thrilled with our result. It's a big deal for me and for the team, and we're hoping to do well in Phoenix on April 9th and 10th.

Karl Thomson