Round 1: Decatur (United States Grand Prix)

The teams - with the exception of Rookie Racing - arrived Thursday in Decatur to setup for Practice 1 on Friday. Randy Callahan set the fastest lap in the session of 1:33.435, whilst Josh Mertz was .010 off of that time.

Onboard Lap
Classification:
P No. Driver Time
1 44 R Callahan 1:33.435
2 81 J Mertz 1:33.445
3 98 M Venturi 1:33.513
4 32 S Porter 1:33.559
5 41 M Vonduvadel 1:33.578
6 07 R Quiroga 1:33.598
7 09 N Carlson 1:33.601
8 88 C Schacher 1:33.624
9 16 E Royer 1:33.638
10 91 J Quinn 1:33.719
11 26 B Avalos 1:33.722
12 37 J Pierce 1:33.744
13 67 A Sweet 1:33.792
14 77 Z Johnson 1:33.800
15 27 F Fogelson 1:33.832
16 17 B Beriault 1:33.879
17 48 C Haas 1:32.882
18 85 P Esteban 1:33.896
19 9 R Smith 1:33.956
20 99 M Oppenheimer 1:33.977
21 1 R Carpenter 1:33.983
22 46 B Camphausen 1:34.016
23 2 N Bradstone 1:34.061
24 3 R Mertz 1:34.102

TOP 2 FINISHERS INTERVIEWS, KINDLY REPRODUCED BY THE GRC:

Tim Baltazar: Here are the Top 2 finishers of Practice 1 for the Red Bull United States Grand Prix. In First, for Bi-Winning Motorsports, Randy Callahan. In Second, for Mertz Racing Technologies, Josh Mertz. Max Venturi has declined to be interviewed, and we will accept this. Moving on. Randy, tell us about your lap and how satisfying it is to beat the MRT cars in the first official practice session?

RC: It's definitely a fun experience. I was pushing the car to the limit, nearly killed the tires on my fastest lap so I pulled into the pits with about 8 minutes left to put new tires on and wait for the track to clear a bit. Obviously I didn't need to do that as Josh was held up by backmarkers which was unfortunate for him but to come away with this is unbelievable. I know its just practice but this team has worked so hard to get here it's pretty gratifying to sit in this seat, knowing I've just beaten the best team in the series.

TB: Thank you, Randy. Josh, it seems you ran your fast lap and just tried to push the car further, why?

JM: Well, I could not pit obviously as there was not enough time for me to pull in and have the guys bolt new tires on. I don't understand why my dad kept racing me, it's practice! Haha. Anyway, it was a fun session. I can't believe I lost out on P1 by a hundredth of a second! Randy drove a fantastic lap to get in front of me and I applaud him for it. I'm looking forward to P2 and qualifying tomorrow and the race on Sunday. We have a fast car and I know I can put it up front.

Last edited by Josh Mertz on Sat Jan 14, 2012 2:17 am; edited 1 time in total

Qualifying was held Saturday at a sunny Decatur Raceway. In a shock, Zack Johnson denied the Mertz Racing Technologies teammates of Ron and Josh Mertz a front row sweep, as Johnson went nearly a second quicker than what Callahan ran on Friday.

Classification:
P # DRIVER TIME
1 77 Z Johnson 1:32.752
2 3 R Mertz 1:32.777
3 81 J Mertz 1:32.958
4 88 C Schacher 1:33.012
5 85 P Esteban 1:33.069
6 26 B Avalos 1:33.208
7 17 B Beriault 1:33.221
8 27 F Fogelson 1:33.280
9 44 R Callahan 1:33.365
10 1 R Carpenter 1:33.811
11 9 R Smith 1:33.878
12 16 E Royer 1:33.884
13 46 B Camphausen 1:34.117
14 37 J Pierce 1:35.308
15 32 S Porter 1:35.952
16 67 A Sweet 1:36.409
17 07 R Quiroga 1:36.688
18 09 N Carlson 1:36.952
19 98 M Venturi --
20 41 M Vonduvadel --
21 91 J Quinn --
22 99 M Oppenheimer --
23 2 N Bradstone --
24 48 C Haas --

TOP 3 QUALIFIERS INTERVIEWS, KINDLY REPRODUCED BY THE GRC:

Tim Baltazar: So here are the top 3 qualifiers for the Red Bull United States Grand Prix. On Pole Position, for MONSTER Energy Racing, Zack Johnson. In Second place, for Mertz Racing Technologies, Ron Mertz, and in third position, also for Mertz Racing Technologies, Josh Mertz. Zack, an incredible lap sees you in Pole Position for the first ever GRC race. What are your thoughts about this?

ZJ: Totally didn't expect this at all, but the team put an amazing car together for this race and I'm really excited to see what'll happen on race day.

TB: Thanks. Ron, you were slowest in P1, and you get second for the race. How do you feel with this?

RM: It's definitely an improvement. I was still feeling out the car, these tires and the track on Friday, hence why I was last and having a little fun with my son at the end. Good lap from me and a great car from the boys in the garage helped a bunch. I love this track, I don't know much about it though. Hopefully I can extend this luck to the race and possibly win!

TB: Thank you Ron. Onto you, Josh. It seems the racing gods don't want you to lead a session...

JM: Hahaha. It seems so. Our car wasn't too good going up the hill there, it seems I lost a bit of time as my engineer was guiding me through and telling me how I was doing. It was a good lap, good enough to get me to third on the grid so thats good. Not too far back, so I won't be clobbered in the hornets nest in mid pack. Hopefully I can stay in the front and lead some laps and hopefully pull a win out!

Re: Round 1: Decatur (United States Grand Prix) Sat Jan 14, 2012 2:11 am by Jrod

Jared Pierce and Shaun Porter share their thoughts on an interesting practice and Q session:

Pierce: "Well, we just haven't figured out the set up for the track yet, but maybe with some minor tweaking, we can figure something out for the race."

Porter: "The car was doing really well in practice, but somehow, it changed up during Q. Hopefully we can figure out what needs to be done in order to get it right."

Blake Camphausen offers his thoughts on the sessions.
"Overall, the car ran well, I'm just not used to this track. A solid 13th place grid space though. Vonduvadel ran well, but he threw it off in Qualifying. Hopefully we can improve for the race.

Last edited by Josh Mertz on Sat Jan 14, 2012 9:16 pm; edited 1 time in total

Practice 2 was held Saturday after qualifying, allowing the teams to dial in their setups and have the drivers refine their driving lines. Michael Travis Vonduvadel edged Josh Mertz by 2 tenths of a second to win P2.

Classification:
P # DRIVER TIME
1 41 M Vonduvadel 1:32.199
2 81 J Mertz 1:32.370
3 1 R Carpenter 1:32.458
4 27 F Fogelson 1:32.473
5 98 M Venturi 1:32.489
6 16 E Royer 1:32.508
7 77 Z Johnson 1:32.595
8 9 R Smith 1:32.608
9 67 A Sweet 1:32.704
10 99 M Oppenheimer 1:32.706
11 91 J Quinn 1:32.728
12 85 P Esteban 1:32.752
13 09 N Carlson 1:32.848
14 46 B Camphausen 1:32.850
15 26 B Avalos 1:32.863
16 48 C Haas 1:32.923
17 32 S Porter 1:32.930
18 2 N Bradstone 1:32.938
19 3 R Mertz 1:32.953
20 44 R Callahan 1:32.957
21 07 R Quiroga 1:33.002
22 37 J Pierce 1:33.032
23 88 C Schacher 1:33.053
24 17 B Beriault 1:33.060

TOP 3 FINISHERS INTERVIEWS, KINDLY REPRODUCED BY THE GRC:

Tim Baltazar: So here we have the top 3 finishers in Practice 2 for the Red Bull United States Grand Prix. In First, for Blake Camphausen Motorsports, Michael Travis Vonduvadel. In Second, for Mertz Racing Technologies, Josh Mertz. Third, for Silver Green Racing, Randy Carpenter. Michael, a brilliant lap has you denying Josh a win in any session so far this weekend, you must be proud?

MTV: Yes, I am. The team have done a fantastic job. Be prepared for this to become a regular thing.

TB: Thank you, Michael. Josh, denied once again. Is it something with the car, or your driving line?

JM: I have no idea, to be honest. As you said yesterday I'm pretty sure the racing gods do not want me to lead a session. Overall our P2 session was smooth, I was able to get nice laps in without being held up by my father. All joking aside, I hope I can keep this pace up for the race.

TB: Thank you, Josh. Randy, defending champion, with this pace do you think you can keep up for the race?

RC: The car finally worked the way I wanted to, so everybody can expect to see that #1 car up front.

I really liked the practice session video. Can't wait! Very Happy

I'm going all out on this race, making a complete full coverage World Feed Very Happy

This could end up being epic.

Lets just say I have quite legit Team Radio audio bits in there Very Happy

This is going to be amazing

I'll be working vigorously on this in the morning. It's 2 hours and 11 minutes long (estimated) so I hope you guys have time to watch it all! Smile

Update: Finals week this week, won't have time to edit the video. I'll get back to working on it this weekend Very Happy

Looking forward to it.

The workload for full world feed broadcasts is tremendous, plus none of you would watch a 2 hour race. So I'm thinking of having a 30 minute recap "show" for each race.

Good idea as I don't have anywhere enough spare time to watch 2 hour races.

Do whatever you want.

I'm thinking about doing a FOM Race Edit kinda thing with this race, as an experiment Smile

Josh Mertz wrote:: I'm thinking about doing a FOM Race Edit kinda thing with this race, as an experiment

As the entire review? I say no.

I don't know what to do. Race Edit would be easiest, the World Feed is long and a lot of work...the recap I want to aim for like 30 minutes i guess

Due to the issues I had, I'm redoing the race. Redid Quali, but not doing the interviews.

Are you going to post the practice speeds?

didn't run practice.

» Decatur Test
» RATCLIFFE: A look at the Decatur Raceway.

Round 1: Decatur (United States Grand Prix)

Round 1: Decatur (United States Grand Prix) :: Comments

Round 1: Decatur (United States Grand Prix)

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