LG Motorsports

Hi Guys, first, if you don't want to know the outcome click off now. The race will be shown tomorrow Saturday the 10th On Speed TV at 1:00 pm eastern time.

This track is always a great track for me. I have raced there for years. My first professional pole position was at Mosport.

This year, I qualified on the outside pole with a 1:23.0 lap time. The only consolation was that I got beat out for the pole position by another Corvette (Leighton Reece) but of course, he had LG Pro Long Tube headers installed. So it was an all LG PLT Header front row. Third qualifier was Max Papis, with Ron Fellows 4th or 5th.

The start was kind of crazy with the Cadillac CTSv of Max Papis beating us into turn one. But then something happened to his car and he started to spin. I managed to avoid him but 7 of his best friends didn't. I took the lead from the outside pole but we got a full course yellow before we came around to complete the first lap.

At the restart, I led the first lap but got a slick move put on me by Ron Fellows in a second Cadillac. He slid under me in turn 10. I countered with the cross over repass but being a GM car, if I carried the pass all the way into turn 1, it would result in one or both of us crashing. So I pulled behind Ron and kept pace.

Our mission in conjunction with GM and the Caddys was to keep the Porsche out of the top 2 spots. We had a secondary mission that said that if we could win with the Corvette we would do that but only if it didn't jeprodize (read Crash) the our Corvette or the Cadillac out of the race.

We ran a clean no contact race with the CTSv of Ron fellows and finished .8 sec behind Ron at the finish. There were a couple of times where we might have taken the position away but again, if it was a Porsche or Viper we would have taken the chance. But because it was our GM Brother, we felt that we could not take the chance of crashing both cars out.

The only down side of the whole race was in the Victory circle. A very happy Ron Fellows gave me a big "Kiss" on my cheek!!! OMG thank god it was my cheek! We were both really happy with the results for caddy and for Corvette.

Our LG Motorsports Corvette has been up front quite a bit this season. 3rd place St Pete, 4th place at Mid Ohio, 1st place at Sears Point (infineon), 1st place at Portland, and 2nd place at Mosport. Plus we qualified on the front row 4 times and got 2 pole positions (Lime Rock and Infineon)

We will have Dino Crescentini in the car for the last race of the season at Laguna Seca. Dino was driving the car at Portland for the win and he will be back in for the last race.

The Mosport race was a fun race. Ron and I both missed the big crash in turn one. I qualified 2nd and ron qualified 5th.

In the end Andy Pilgrim in the other cadillac CTSv finished 4th to add to his lead in the point championship over the Viper of Archer.

Check out the Speed TV coverage tomorrow at 1:00 est time. I had a Speed TV in car camera going for the race so there should be some good footage.

I will also have my own in car camera up next week on our video web site www.LGMracing.com so you can see the up close action.

thanks

Lou Gigliotti LGM

LTC Z06

COOL

John Shiels

MUKAK

xsiveone

varkwso

Thanks for the recap - hope I can get to see it today on TV. Your talent to build and race great cars is evident...

AU N EGL

Max Papus missded a gear on the first corner.

Oyishdog

wow that was a messy start...err, first corner i mean

Vette Butler

Rockenfeller seemed to imply that the Vettes were to blame for the pileup. Said they were 'real slow' at the start.

Perhaps Lou can elaborate.

AU N EGL

The caddies have 'launch control' and the vettes dont. Might make for a weeeee bit of take of difference.

Oyishdog

I think papis' shift from 2nd to 1st instead of 2nd to 3rd caused the entire thing....you could hear the miss on the replay in car video

Ill also add, that you could hear Lou's car banging off the rev limiter at the start...no traction, not slow off the start

LG Motorsports

A Porsche has the engine in the rear behind the transmission(like a Volkswagon). they have over 65% of their weight on the rear of the car. They launch quite good to say the least.

I think that Rockenfeller should use his launching advantage to help himself, rather than blame anyone for a "slow start". You will notice that both of the Corvettes launched about equal. In fact, I got a car length jump on Leighton to draw up even with him when the Caddy spun.

Without the spin by Papis the start would have been clean and competitive with Rockenfeller in 4th or 5th. I wish we could have raced with him just so we could "whip" him American V8 style.

So, other than the Papis spin the first corner crash would have been less severe if the Viper of Weins would have used discression and lifted off the gas. That Viper came back across the path of the Gaples Corvette when he should have lifted and got his car under control. this would have allowed him to avoid the path of the oncoming cars.

The other thing is that Rockenfeller ran over Leighton's C6 when Leighton lifted to avoid the spinning CTSv. Lifting to avoid an accident in front of you is not the cause of someone hitting you from behind.

Thanks and I hope you enjoyed the race. it was plenty of fun.

LG

Vette Butler

Thanks, Lou. That brings it together for me.

And I too am glad that Fellows kissed you where he did.

NJCRUISER

I was just talking to Gaples. He hit Weins at 64 mph! Ouch. He's OK and his crew is rebuilding the car for Laguna Seca. Frame damage. Weins reportedly got his bell rung pretty good at impact being that it was a side hit. But everybody is ok. I still think Weins should have slowed up some more if it were possible before turning back onto the track. Seems to me he gambled not lifting thinking he could ride the grass and blend back in at speed. Guess that backfired.

LG Motorsports

I think you hit that nail right on the head. experience would have let Weins to do it differently. I am sure that in the future, he will.

If you look at Dale Earnhardt's accident, it didn't look any worse than Tony G's hit on the Viper. Racing is great fun, but is comes with risk. I just don't want someone making a mistake like the Viper did and causing harm to another person.

Thank God that no one was hurt. The HANS neck support probably saved Tony Gaples and Tim Weins from being injured.


LG

BrianCunningham

Nice to see the season turn around for Corvettes!

John Shiels

We saw that before unfortunately with a car in the grass and not lifting, Same type also. Papis just hurt his negotiating for the next contract and made a bunch of new friends I think. Interesting race and Lou is due some respect from GM. You diidn't get the trophy but as I saw it you won the race. Lou you have a great team behind you. Some of it's family support at the track, shop and home. That must make it more rewarding and easy.

johnsea06

Congrats!

I'm sorry I missed seeing the race (went fishing & caught some dolphin for dinner). I will look forward to seeing the video when posted.

Maybe one day SpeedTV will replay some of the races during the week instead endless replays of the same NASCAR shows... but I'm not complaining too much... too much NASCAR better than no SpeedTV.

fhturner

I was just thinking the same thing-- it has been fun to watch you fight through some early misfortune to have some good success in the latter half of the season. It was frustrating at the end of last season (when I first started watching Speed GT) and first part of this one to see Corvettes lagging well behind the competition. You, Leighton Reese, and Tony Gaples have had some good runs lately and really stepped it up. Congratulations on your success as of late!

Damn! Dino had a great run at Portland, but I'm sorry to see that you won't be back in the car for the last race of the season. I'll still be pulling for the team, tho... (of course!)

That was the most frightening part of that whole Lap 1 incident. I know what Wiens was thinking, but...what was he THINKING?! If you can't get your car back under control after going 4-off, then you ought not be gassing the hell out of it, thinking you can save it once you re-encounter asphalt! Before he ever went off-track, I saw him plunge in between 2 spinning cars and thought, "Why is that car going so fast through there? He's never gonna make it." Sure enough, he wound up lucky just to not have seriously injured someone...

Anyway, great run, Lou. Congrats on the win--er, second place. We all know who should have won [<rant> "Team orders" /= "racing" </rant>]...

Fred

JiminFL

Lou,

Congratulations on your hard-earned success at Mosport and all year long. I'm also glad to hear Tony is ok after a pretty scary hit.

I know that you work very hard to field your team, and you are to be commended for the sense of GM loyalty you displayed by supressing your competitive urges for the greater good.

I can't wait for Laguna, and will be there again with my son to root for the Caddys. It makes it very exciting knowing Dave's in a position to win the manufacturer's title and realize a 3 year goal, not to mention Andy being in good shape for the driver's championship.

I'll look for you to say hey (don't worry, I won't kiss you) and I wish the best for Dino. Actually, I hope Dino finishes somewhere between a winning Caddy and the first Porsche. It will also be nice to see Chevy finish ahead of the Vipers for manufacturers points. Great job.

Jim Spitzer