A Race Engineer's Perspective

Rick Mayer, race engineer of the Risi Competizione No. 62 Ferrari 488 GTLM team, takes a look ahead at this year's Long Beach sprint race, April 16, 2016, at the Long Beach street circuit.Rick Mayer, race engineerPilots of the Risi Competizione Ferrari 488 for the BUBBA Burger Sports Car Grand Prix at Long Beach 100-minute race are Giancarlo Fisichella (Italy) and Toni Vilander (Finland).General: The Long Beach entry list has 25 cars, including 10 very competitive GTLM entries from five manufacturers. This is a three class race; GTLM, PC (LMPC) and P. This will be the largest field we've had here since American Le Mans Series (ALMS), with the addition of the LMPCs this year. The addition of the Pro-Am LMPC class will make this short 100-minute race much more difficult for all the GTLM cars than recent years when it was just P cars and GTLMs.GTLM Competition: The BMWs won here last year; they are always quick at Long Beach. This year the entire GTLM field has the 2016 upgraded aero, including three completely new cars (Ferrari, BMW and Ford), which coincidentally are all turbo charged, as the rule excluding turbo charged engines was changed for 2016. The Balance of Performance (BoP) keeps evolving, trying to sort out what's an unfair BoP advantage, what's a good setup and who is not showing true pace (sandbagging). It is not an easy puzzle for IMSA to unscramble. The first three tracks of the season are all anomalies and difficult from which to adjust BoP. Daytona is all about banking speed, Sebring is super bumpy and hard to have a good setup for all the conditions and Long Beach is a true street track with unique setup requirements that relate to no other tracks. Sebring was a difficult race to gauge BoP, as the conditions were ever changing. For sure the F488 GTLM doesn't have the straight-line performance of the others. That will handicap the F488 GTLMs at Long Beach. The BMWs 'showed' superior straight-line performance at Sebring and showed quick general pace. The BMWs got a small boost reduction for Long Beach but they should still be the quickest. The Corvettes showed they still have some performance in hand with dominant final stints and the Fords were quick when needed. The Porsches were super-fast in the wet and held their own in the dry. You have to give the BMWs the edge at Long Beach closely followed closely by the Corvettes. Currently the Ferrari, Ford and Porsches are all in a similar window of performance.The track: The entire Long Beach 1.97 mile, 11-turn, street circuit is passenger- car-filled most of the year. Cars, trucks and busses idle at the traffic lights and occasionally drop fluid (oil, fuel and engine coolant) creating a low grip surface. The crowning of the road leads to some off-camber corners upsetting the balance typically mid-corner out. The track is bumpy, in a washboard fashion, quite different than Sebring. The track will be really dirty, and cold, for our 'track cleaning' 7:40 a.m. two-hour first session. Like most temporary street circuits, grip changes with each session and you really only start seeing a partial picture of what the car is doing at the end of the two hour session, after the track has cleaned up and some rubber has gone down on the surface. This track's tendency is to move toward under-steer for the race. How much is the question? The front straight is slightly curved but is full throttle with a very high top speed. A good exit off the 40 mph hairpin is essential for overtaking into Turn 1. There are very few passing opportunities here. Qualifying position is super important as is great pit work.

2015 Long Beach Grand Prix

The setup: All the GTLM competitors, except Ford, have been here before, but not all with their current spec or model of car. So some starting setups may suffer. The car needs good power down, particularly off the hairpin, to either pass in braking into Turn 1 or to keep from getting passed. All the corners are slow (mainly first or second gear) so it's brake, turn-in and back to full throttle quickly. While some apex curbs are usable, some you have to stay off of, as they are large (huge) bolted down temporary curbs. The car needs some change of direction stability in the last section leading up to the hairpin, and around the fountain, so you can't run too soft of a setup. You need good brakes but you don't trail brake into the corners here as much as other race tracks so rear stability under braking is not 'as big' a concern. Braking zones are bumpy (washboard) further complicating the setup. Reducing the low speed under-steer coming off the brake to the apex and having good traction and corner exit (without a lot of understeer) are keys to quick laps as all the corners are essentially short duration. You always run maximum downforce here even though it's tempting to try and achieve a higher front straight top speed by trimming aero.The race: Is only 100 minutes. There is no minimum driver time in the Pro classes; if there's any caution periods everyone will likely change drivers. One driver could essentially do the entire race. The fuel will be tight as the fuel tanks are small, we cannot run much more than half a race on a full tank of VP E20 fuel. The first stint will be shorter due to fuel used for the reconnaissance lap and the 2 pace laps. A timed fuel fill and a driver's change will be done on the one and only stop. That's if it's green all the way, and if that's the strategy you choose. The biggest change from recent Long Beach races is the addition of the Pro-Am content LMPCs; first time since 2013. This will make the early stages of the race extremely difficult. All the Am LMPC drivers will likely qualify and start the race, as you want your Pro's in at the end. The start will put slower Am driven PCs ahead of faster all Pro GTLMs, due to the IMSA split starts. Once the GTLMs get up to the back end of the LMPCs the problems will start. It will be very difficult for GTLMs to pass an Am driven LMPC car. If IMSA staggers the starts with a long enough interval, the GTLMs might not encounter the LMPCs until late in the first stint. Any early cautions would aggravate this situation significantly. If managed correctly, the two car GTLM teams could have an advantage by being able to split their strategies, in yellow situations or even under a full green flag race. They can hedge their bets, when the strategy call isn't obvious.The Ferrari should be quick here; Risi Competizione has won this race in class in years past and fared well last year, finishing second. We need a good, solid and clean run, and a little luck, to hopefully start a podium streak this year.Tune-In Information:The BUBBA Burger Sports Car Grand Prix race is available live in the U.S. on April 16, on Fox Sports 2 and on the FOX Sports GO! mobile app at 7:00 p.m. EST/4:00 p.m. PDT and on Fox Sports 1 at 11:00 p.m. EDT/8:00 p.m. EDT. The International fans can watch the race stream live with IMSA Radio commentary at IMSA.com.