Michael Johnson - First race in New Zealand...

Best of luck Michael!

 

Thanks for the info Rob, we should hear from Michael shortly.

 

Hey Everyone,

Just got back to Texas late last night and survived my first day back in class.

The experience in New Zealand was fantastic. I was blown away by the level of their motorsports. They do a whole lot right in regards to promotion and commercialization of the sport and as a result the environment is much more frienly to finding sponsors and being able to race properly. In New Zealand there are basically three sports 1) Rugby 2) Motorsports and 3) Cricket in that order.

To say the competition was stout would be a dramatic understatement. The least experienced (in regards to open-wheel) driver (aside from myself) just won the BMW Asia series in his rookie season. The majority of the drivers there were on their 2nd or 3rd season in the series. In the paddock to my left side was an ex- BAR-Honda Mechanic, to my right was an ex-Tyrell F1 engineer, and in the same pit was an ex- McLaren-Mercedes mechanic. When my competitors rolled their cars out for the first practice session on Thursday they were within half a second of the lap record and simply refining minor details, while I was trying to sort out which way the track went.

My not finding the pace was simply a matter of time. The Pukekohe racetrack is scary. The average speed around the circuit was around 120 mph with the top speed over 160 miles per hour. At 90% of the circuits distance the armco barrier is within 5 feet of the track.

On Thursday morning as I was touring the track for the first time I noticed a spec of something here and a bit of something there. As I crested the hill I saw the remains of one of my competitors cars who 'walled it' at around 130 mph. I decided at that point it would be wiser to gradually build up speed than jumping to what I think is a reasonable pace and risk doing the same.

Every session during the weekend my times got lower and lower. In the first race I wasn't on pace, however by the second race I had picked up enough pace to run with the top 12, some luck came my way and I ended up 9th. In the final race with my hopes high, my car suffered from a fuel sensor failure, causing my engine to go to the maximum rich setting to avoid hurting itself. The net result was a loss off 1000 rpm's down the straights. I was able to stay out of harms way and still do a decent result, but it wasn't as good as it could have been had everything been working properly.

Admitidly I wasn't near where I wanted or expected to be, but perhaps it was a bit of the naive American in me that had gave me these unrealistic goals. The fact of the matter was this was no club racing affair and to win at this level requires a perfect unison of car, track, and driver. If any one of those bits is off-pace even in the first session of the week it would take a lot of clawing back to make up.

at the end of the weekend I have grown tremendously. My driving comfort in an open-wheel car has gone way up, but most importantly I know what it is going to take to get to a level to compete for the top spot on the podium.

Thank you all for your support and especially the Texas F-chatters who have stood behind my cause in no particular order: Rob, Phil, Daniel Pass of Ricambi America, Jim, Will, Nicola, Carolyn, and the many others who have given their support.

Cheers

Michael,
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