Well, it’s pro-racing time again! We have had 4 months off since the Daytona race and I have filled my time by losing 20 lbs. and getting back into shape! I have also been doing as much racing as possible to keep my head in the game.

The race this past weekend was a Lime Rock Park in Connecticut. It is a historic short track – 1.53 miles long with some elevation changes and fast laps – there are 10 turns – 9 right-handers and 1 left-hander with average speeds around the track at 90+ MPH!

I was getting a bit concerned about a month before the race when I saw that the entry list had grown to 50 cars – a huge field of cars on the smallest track of the season – a recipe for disaster!

I was able to get a test at LRP in the MINI Cooper S prior to the race and the cars were incredible! We were turning times in the test session that would have put us at the top of the pack of the race from last year!

Race day was beautiful weather! Lime Rock Park is so green – I had forgotten how green it all looks since I have been living in Arizona!

Since I was turning the faster lap times in our car, I was chosen to qualify and start the race. This will be the first time I was to qualify and start the pro-race – usually I am a second or third stint driver, but with all the racing I have been doing, I felt very comfortable in the car.

The practice sessions before the qualifying were littered with wrecks, offs, and general mayhem with that many cars on the track. It was important just to “keep your nose clean” and keep away from contact with the other cars.

Qualifying was a 15 minute session and I had a great position on the grid for qualifying. There were only like 10 cars ahead of me, so that meant I might get some open track, but unfortunately, I had some issues with the fuel delivery system in the car as I left pit lane to go onto the track and had to turn the car off and restart it – so I pulled off line and kept rolling and got that done, but let a couple of cars by in the mean time.

I started warming up the tires in the first couple of laps and one of my teammates was behind me and wanted to get by, so I let him by and just tucked in underneath him. Then we turned it on! The cars were handling so well, we could pass any of the other cars in any of the corners! In fact, during the first practice, Owen Trinkler, the team’s pro driver turned the fastest lap of the weekend and set a new KONI CHALLENGE ST Class track record!

We got a couple of fast laps in and then I was really on a flyer that was going to be a very fast lap and the black flag came out – big accident. So we all came off the track at with 6 minutes left in the qualifying session and while we waited for them to clean up the track and tow the cars, they checkered the qualifying – it was over.

This caught a lot of teams by surprise as they were going in late in the session to get their fast laps and now they wouldn’t be able to – something to remember – get your fast lap done earlier!!

I ended up with the fastest qualifying time of the MINIs and qualified 13th out of 49 cars – a good showing and a good spot since I would be on the 7th row, inside towards the front and less to deal with in turn 1.

For the race, I got to my grid position, took several deep breaths and completely relaxed. It is the strangest feeling to be sitting in the race car, strapped down in a 5-pt. harness, in full fire-retardant gear, in a helmet and HANS (Head and Neck restraint System), getting ready to race against 48 other cars at high speed and be relaxed, but that is why I am so addicted to this sport.

The race started and I let a couple of the more aggressive cars go by and took it clean and easy into the first couple of turns as this is a 2.5 hour race – which is not won in the first corner! Let them go and take each other out – which sure enough, was happening.

I got into a groove and really started to relax more and found myself slipping down in my seat during the race – I had to keep forcing myself to sit up. My hands and arms were so relaxed that I didn’t feel tired or sore – just driving! I got into a pack with a Chevy Cobalt (#13 and a Mazda Miata (#146) and we raced – trading positions several times during a lap, but everyone keeping it clean – and then it hit me – I was racing with the pros and trading positions with them. I got past the Miata and started to pour on more speed around the track and pulled away from him up to the Cobalt. This Cobalt is a known aggressive driver – a wrecker or checker kinda driver (win or wreck trying). The team was yelling at me on the radio to stay away from him as he knocked one of the MINIs off the track last year at Virginia and this car also took out the race leader at Daytona when he was about to be put a lap down – dangerous stuff.

So, I went to work on him – I stayed back, but kept poking the nose of the car underneath him in turns trying to get him to brake later or turn harder to get him to wear out his left front tire so eventually he would run wide and I would get by him cleanly. As I was doing this – we got a full course yellow – one car was upside down at the outside of the track. Driver got out and walked away uninjured.

We decided to pit and take on more fuel – at this point I have been in the car racing for about 1 hr and 20 minutes and it was almost time to hand over the car to my co-driver.

We go to restart and I get the fuel delivery issue and the car goes down on power. I slow the car for a few laps and restart and even pull the master power switch to see if I can clear the issue. I can’t fix it. So, I decide, keep going – while I was deciding this the lead cars catch me to lap me and I pull wide to let them go through underneath me and give them all the room on the track. The first car came through fine, the second car, a different Chevy Cobalt (#53 – Driver Robert Boyer) slid up into me at the exit of turn 2 and slams into the side of my car hard. My car spins off into the grass with little power. I nurse the car around and can’t get to pit lane to assess the damage, but I am only able to go 4 MPH. It is excruiating. I finally get the car to the paddock and they send a crew member over who says, you need a new back tire and goes and get the tire and jack to fix it. I get out and let Craig Hansen, co-driver, take over. We fix the car and get him back on the track – our day is done, but we can at least try to finish the race.

We are about 20 laps down and have fallen from a top position of 8th all the way to 39th and we never recovered. 6 laps into Craig’s stint, he gets hit and his tire is damaged and he can’t continue. Now, the day is truly over.

Here is the write-up from the team owner on our race:

197: Rick Johnson was our best qualifier at the 13th position. He eventually moved up to 8th. Rick was a ‘man on fire’. It was exciting to watch. I personally think it was Rick’s best performance ever. He was just awesome. Unfortunately, lady luck intervened. Rick was broadsided by a Chevy Colbalt in big bend, knocking off the right side mirror and sending him into a ‘bog’ where he got stuck. Eventually, the safety crew hooked him out and got him back to the truck where Craig Hansen took the wheel and re-entered the track. He made a valiant attempt to salvage the day but it was not to be. Driving without the mirror created a blind spot and he was hit by another car that broke the right rear wheel. The car got stuck out on the track and was unable to make it back to pit road.

Overall, it was a great weekend – I now know that I can race with the pros and have gained their respect on the track. I was even in contention for Rookie of Year – I know a 38 year-old rookie is pretty funny, but hey, why not! With this finish, I won’t be in contention anymore, but keep an eye on Andrew Aquilante – he’s 20 years old and is a great driver!

The team has told me that if we had paired me with the pro driver, we would have won the race. That’s awesome – to get a chance to win one of these races would be amazing!

Oh yeah, remember that Mazda that I passed? He ended up in second place…

Ricky “Boo-Boo” Johnson