Yeah, but he only finished second on Dancing with the Stars...
He’s no Hélio on the dance floor but James Hinchcliffe is a natural in the commentary booth.
According to Wikipedia, if he “did not succeed as a professional racing driver, Hinchcliffe wanted to be a motorsports journalist.” Plan B is working out quite nicely. I find his commentary on F1 TV Pro and Peacock’s IndyCar coverage more engaging and enlightening than that of other former drivers behind the mic, if only because his open-wheel experience is more recent than that of, say, Jolyon Palmer or Townsend Bell.
Given McLaren’s superb performance at Silverstone during qualifying I watched the British Grand Prix with great interest but my main focus this weekend was the IMSA Chevrolet Grand Prix from Canadian Tire Motorsport Park – more commonly known as Mosport – because my next in-person race experience will be the 2023 FCP Euro Northeast Grand Prix presented by LIQUI MOLY, July 21 to July 22 at Lime Rock Park. Mosport was the last IMSA race before LRP and the event seemed a little less messy than Watkins Glen but I can’t say I’ll miss the LMP3s next year for the chaos they inflict. I get that the class is Pro-Am but so is GTD and we don’t see nearly the level of ineptitude displayed in those cars that we do in the ugly and raucous mini prototypes – and we certainly don’t need them as field fillers any longer. As to the broadcast itself, my biggest issue with Peacock is its lack of “side-by-side/non-stop” picture-in-picture as used on USA/NBC. In the good old days of TrackPass (three whole seasons ago), when the OTA broadcast took a commercial break the audio/video feed continued to stream, sans voiceover. We didn’t know how good we had it!
I always attend my current IMSA “home” races these days – the Rolex 24 at Daytona and the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring – but I haven’t been to Lime Rock since the 2008 American Le Mans Series multi-class event, won by Scott Sharp and David Brabham in the Patrón Highcroft Racing Acura ARX-01B. Of particular interest that year were the contingent of teams just back from the Twenty Four Hours of Le Mans that had US connections, like the second-place GT1 Corvette and the overall-winner LMP1 Audi Sport North America Audi R10 TDI. Growing up in Boston, Lime Rock or the former Bryar Motorsport Park (remnants of which remain at New Hampshire Motor Speedway) could have been considered home tracks but in fact the one I drove most was Thompson Speedway in Thompson, Connecticut (fun fact: racing began there August 16, 1952, eight days before I was born).
Which brings me to this week’s focus on Thompson and the impetus behind my latest Substack scibblings: the need to escape the clutches of Facebook.
My current Facebook account is my fourth, the previous three having been hacked. In addition to being a dreadful time suck, FB is a piss poor solution to archiving memories, including photographs, so over the past twenty-four hours I’ve copied all my posts to Google Docs, dating back to early 2020 when I created this FB iteration. By coincidence, a few days ago Classic Motorsports published Before Lime Rock and Road America, there was Thompson Raceway which presented the perfect opportunity to create a prototype for future hybrid photographic/text motorsport reminiscences. We’ll see how it works out.
First, a photo gallery from 1975. Clockwise from upper left:
My friend Mark's formerly Polaris '72 Bavaria. Bear in mind, black was the rarest of all BMW colors back then and Mark wanted black. I'd forgotten about the BWA SportStars, which I had on my second Colorado 2002. And yes, that does appear to be duct tape that we were required to stick on our headlights.
Skip Barber instructor Tony Scotti, me in my Peterbilt cap.
Some slalom practice before...
Some slalom practice before...
Lapping!
The day of these photos, quite a few laps in, I missed a downshift approaching this final turn leading back onto the oval which caused me to brake too hard and lock the fronts, sending me directly towards that dirt banking. I actually had time to ponder the cost of a tow back to Boston but at the last second I thought to take my foot OFF the brake pedal (which was counter-intuitive as hell) and the car darted left. Which taught me to heed what one of the instructors had been chiding me about – not relying on a downshift to slow for a turn! Lesson learned.
Thompson’s road course closed soon after this track day although the oval remained in continuous use for local short track racing. Note the rough condition of the asphalt!
My '71 2002 ti/Alpina clone, looking pretty battered by late 1975. It still irks me that I didn't go to Gene Murphy Auto Body when I got hit from behind (note the mismatched Colorado orange). Of course, five Boston winters didn’t help!
And another gallery, this one from 2014 just after the reconfigured and freshly paved road course reopened after decades of disuse, opening with this vintage event:
Lovely stuff although I shed a tear when the LMP3 class is described as "mini prototypes" because from a sports racer owner's perspective they are quite serious machines!
Asked and answered. Thanks!