St. Petersburg Race Weekend Recap

This past weekend was the season opening race for IndyCar and the support series in St. Petersburg Florida. Like me, I am sure every race fan in attendance over the weekend had thoughts of Dan Wheldon. Be sure to visit Dan Wheldon Way which is at Turn 10 on the course.

While there was constant action on the street course track, I don’t recall a race weekend with more names. Depending on the series the event had different sponsors getting their name in the event title: USF2000 Priority Marine Construction Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, Pro Mazda Allied Building Products Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg for IndyCar but only one series didn’t give into corporate pressure: Indy Lights Grand Prix of St. Petersburg!! The Stadium Super Trucks (SST) raced their 2nd season event, billed as “GP of St. Pete”. Kudos to SST, too.

While walking around the fan areas, I heard many exciting comments regarding the SST series. Each year this series draws more attention. Last year during the SST GP of St. Pete, I had the opportunity to interview Robby Gordon, owner and founder. He made a statement which is visually true at every SST race, “IndyCar definitely puts fans in the grandstands, but we take them out of the grandstands and put them at the fence."

Every time the trucks are on track, and yes, the trucks have a very distinct sound, fans stop walking and go to the nearest viewing spot at the fence. This weekend was no exception. Very cool to see kids get a lift up onto dad’s shoulders to get a better view of the jumping trucks.

If you were unable to catch any of the racing, please visit the series website for results. There are many websites which can provide you with the statistics and recap, but I like to write how I saw the race weekend.

Let’s start with Pirelli World Challenge (PWC). What a change from the prior weekend at Circuit of the Americas (COTA) where PWC was the only show in town. This weekend at St. Petersburg, while PWC was on the track for qualifying and the races, that was about it. Very little practice time since the track was so busy with the other series. But Michael Lewis with Effort Racing GT class #41 Porsche 911 didn’t seem to need much practice. He grabbed the pole position and never let go of first place for the weekend.

PWC is always exciting fast pace racing, but the Sunday race, unfortunately, turned out to be a true sprint to the finish race. In only the 2nd lap, Corey Fergus #00 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car made hard contact and moved a concrete wall. I have not heard the cause of the incident but it appeared either Corey lost the back end of the car or “something broke”. I have watched Corey Fergus race for years and I consider him an excellent driver, so I am going to rule out driver error on this one.

While the last report I read, Corey had been taken to the track medical center and released, what worried me most was the length of time it took for medical personnel to arrive on scene. With open cockpit cars, when the television camera zooms in on a driver, you can hopefully see the driver move and with NASCAR, fans wait while the window net is taken down by the driver indicating he is okay. But with an enclosed, windows up, Porsche car, all fans had to hold their breath and wait.

I am not familiar with the layout of the St. Petersburg track or the exact turn Corey’s accident occurred, so I do not know where the closest opening in the wall might be for the safety vehicle to enter the track, but every second counts. I would have thought a medical person could have run to the car sooner and at least provide Corey some comfort.

While I was only able to be at the St. Petersburg event on Saturday, I watched online along with PWC fans to see Corey exit the car. The ambulance pulled up to block the cameras view so I turned to the Twitter accounts of the races series and journalists for updates. With the short duration of a caution free PWC race, many commented on red flagging the race instead of the full course caution due to the length of time the safety crews needed to remove the debris from the incident.

I somewhat agree with the red flag concept and stopping the race, there was a USF 2000 race after the PWC race, with the “spring forward” time change, dusk arriving sooner, and the track not having lights, I would assume a delay was not optional. The PWC race start was already delayed 15 minutes due to the IndyCar race finishing. This is just my opinion, I have no facts on the ruling or if a red flag was officially considered.

One of the interesting and fun things I like to do at the track is take a close look at the sponsors represented on the race cars. Many sponsors are local and products or companies which I am not familiar. At COTA, while looking at the #20 GT Cup Porsche 911 car of Sloan Urry with TruSpeed Autosport, I noticed an unusual decal on the side panel. I am very familiar with TruSpeed, the decal looked like a human brain with a key and lock with “PMGawareness.org” written underneath. You don’t see that every day.

At COTA and St. Petersburg, I caught up with Tyler Tadevic with TruSpeed, who took the time to explain the brain with the key and lock is for “Unlocking the mysteries of Polymicrogyria (PMG)” which according to the website is explained here:

Polymicrogyria- let’s break this big word down into its basic parts. “Poly” means many, “micro” means very small, and “gyria” is the medical term for the wrinkles in the brain. So we have “many very small wrinkles in the brain”.

Tyler has a personal connection to this organization, but I will keep that personal. If you want to know more, please visit Sloan Urry Racing hauler at the next PWC race. While talking to Tyler I recorded this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssbFvVqDYk0

I encourage you to share this video and link to expecting or new mothers. I had not heard of this PMG before noticing the decal on the car, but have read and researched and babies can be helped with early detection.

With so much of a cars’ real estate taken over by sponsors, which are paying to be there, and I understand each team needs funding, it is always refreshing when I see a car or team include an organization which brings attention to a health concern. I encourage each fan to seek out cars and teams prompting health awareness.

So how what was Sloan Urry’s results for the weekend in the GT Cup class at the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg? He won both races! Congratulations, Sloan! To try and keep up with this fast driver, please follow Sloan Urry Racing on Facebook and Twitter @sloanurryracing

And to learn more about PMG please follow the on Facebook at PMG Awareness Organization and Twitter @PMGAwarenessOrg. Please find out how you can spread the word. Thank you!

One of the more known organizations is the Children’s Tumor Foundation which is usually on the full hood of a Karl Thomson Compass 360 car. Maybe you have seen the hashtag #EndNF Please take a minute to learn more from the website: http://www.ctf.org/

Another example is Dr. Jim Norman racing in IMSA always ensures Parathroid is on his race car. What is this you ask? Please read more here: http://www.parathyroid.com/dr.norman.htm

Please stop by the car and mention to the team you appreciate any “public service” type announcement, and do your research on the organization. You or someone you know could be benefit from the research and knowledge. Thank you!

Now onto my comments about the event… the reason you really read my articles! Heading into my Saturday visit, I had read on Twitter from people mentioning the tight security at the entrance gates into the track.

John Dagys ‏@johndagys Mar 11

Well that was only the third time I've ever had to go through a metal detector to get into a racetrack! Very tight security here #PWCSTPGP

I arrived to Gate 5 at 6:45am believing the website schedule and the nice folks at the media credential office which indicated the gates would open at 7am. Wrong! However to my fortune, I saw a gentlemen walking around the Gate 5 fencing area and I inquired as to how he was going to gain entrance into the track.

He mentioned he was an employee and there was “side” gate around the corner for workers and people with credentials. So I followed him. This gate had one security office and no metal detector. I showed my credential and walked on in. Interesting.

The PWC paddock was my first stop. I enjoy getting to the track early and watching the crew start their busy day, like the calm before the storm. I walked past the Indy Lights teams and half of the PWC haulers before I noticed another security gate, seemingly randomly placed in the middle of the PWC paddock. You can walk through the gate to the SST and PWC cars, but the metal detector and security was going to search you on the walk back through. Interesting.

All the fans that made their way over to the PWC paddock for the autograph session, which was past the security point, had to go back through security to return to the Indy side. Okay, I get the security at the track entrance, but inside the paddock area? And it’s only if you were walking. You could hop on a Taylor Dunn or golf cart, and go right around the security gate and come back into the paddock area. Interesting.

All that being said, I had a great time Saturday at the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, or whatever the event is called. Just don’t ask me about the insane drivers on I-275 and I-4 when driving to and from this event. I have driven all across the United States of America, but never seen such ridiculously driving. If you drive I-275 in Tampa or I-4 between Tampa and Daytona, you have my sympathies.

Thank you all for reading and I welcome your comments. I have no affiliation with PWC, IndyCar,

St. Petersburg or any race series. I am just a fan. There are many blogs and websites where you will find statistics, results, and scoring from the race; this is just my view.

Got a response? Follow and tweet me @viclovesracing

And look for future “Vickie’s Trackside Report” coming to a track near you!