Apr072020April 7, 2020November 23, 20210Commentby Brian DeFrees

ChampCar 2020: Endurance Racing (and winning!) For The First Time!

Posted in Motorsports

I was scrolling through one of my social media feeds one day and saw a rallycross buddy was looking for additional drivers for the upcoming Champcar 8-hour enduro at Harris Hill Raceway in San Marcos Texas.

I had been tempted to join since you technically don’t need anything but a valid drivers’ license but always felt weird about piloting someone else’s car without wheel-to-wheel experience under my belt first. Since I knew by the time of the race I would have completed GLTC at COTA in a Rallycar! I decided to pull the trigger and take his offer for a seat.

Thinking back on this and Sierra Cars on ICE! in Maine – both two events that were not easy on the wallet but two events that I’m 110% glad I entered, it was almost as if my subconscious knew there would be no motorsport activity for awhile due to Coronavirus.

This event happened to be the last race Champcar held before postponing any additional races (Same with GLTC) and being my first endurance race and 2nd wheel to wheel race, it was quite the experience!

I learned a crap-ton that weekend… not only about driving but what it takes to build a winning car, how to make the right calls as a crew-chief and how to hustle during a pitstop or when something goes wrong.

Champcar seemed to be more about forming a team of friends and going out to have fun driving which I really liked… everyone was competitive but friendly and drove clean. Over the 3 days I got hours of seat time and now feel totally comfortable being the fast car after being the slowest at COTA in GLTC a month earlier!

 


View this post on Instagram

Before things got really crazy I was lucky enough to join @mister_spaceman @jg_1217 and @ricksoza for the last race of @champcarenduranceseries for the time being and the last race @harris_hill_raceway before they repave it. We placed first overall after 8 hours of nonstop racing and 4 driver swaps in Saturday’s race! Can’t thank these guys enough for building such a fast car and all the time invested it requires to finally make the podium and then allowing me to pilot it in heavy traffic all weekend in only my second wheel to wheel race. In Sunday’s race, I learned I can be a lot quicker in the rain, dropping to 10th off the start but I was just happy I didn’t crash Colin’s car and eventually got us back to 4th overall where we ultimately finished after having the door fly open on track (we quick fixed with zip ties), getting black flagged, and running out of gas before the finish line! Endurance racing is really fun and I’d love to do it again when normal life resumes… the pit stops are almost more intense than the racing!

A post shared by Brian DeFrees (@defrees) on


 


View this post on Instagram

Champcar Endurance Racing at Harris Hill March 2020

A post shared by Brian DeFrees (@defrees) on