The color yellow now high on Curran’s ‘dislike” list

Watch this Watkins Glen Camping World race at 3pm ET on Speed TV.

June 16, 2009

Watkins Glen, NY

The strategy was flawless – expect a full-course-yellow situation at a point where Eric Curran could be brought into the pits for his single refueling of the race, then speed to the checkered flag while teams that pitted earlier had to pit a second time for fuel because they pitted too early.

“The first ‘yellow’ was on lap seven of 54 laps in the race, and as we expected, almost everybody pitted,” Curran said. “The third one was on lap 21, so that’s when my team brought me in. With maybe one more yellow, or two at the most, we should have been good to the finish and hopefully in the top three.”

However, that’s not the way the day worked out in the NASCAR Camping World East Series road race at Watkins Glen International – a track where Eric has raced and won many times over the past nine years.

Despite leading the race from laps 16 thru 21, Eric’s official finish was 16^th. The Whelen Engingeering/ArmorCoat Chevrolet was headed for the hauler by lap 48.  Team owner Sonny Whelen had a great finish ending in 13^th in his Whelen/Coca-Cola Chevrolet.

So how did this happen?

It all started during Friday’s practice sessions on the 2.4-mile “short course” on the famed Upstate New York road course.

“The transmission housing cracked at the end of the practice session before qualifying,” Eric lamented.

“We scrambled to find a spare transmission and got it in just in time for qualifying and still make it into

the top five fast group qualifying. 

“The replacement transmission, however, through nobody’s deliberate fault, had the wrong gear ratios for second and third gears.  And I mean ‘wrong’ in terms of that they would not allow me to get to the right speed before the next shift. What’s worse is I had to find this out in qualifying and had to race the car with the wrong transmission because NASCAR impounds the car until the race.

“To make matters worse,” he added, “the power steering was also failing while qualifying. I pushed real hard and still managed to qualify ninth, despite everything that was against me.”

As if the Whelen Motorsports team didn’t have enough trouble, Eric missed the drivers meeting the day of the race and had to start last. “What are you going to do? We just simply missed it on the schedule” he commented.

As the race began, Eric started his charge towards the front, passing many cars in the opening laps before the first of many caution laps began.

“On lap 22 when I pitted, it was already the third full-course yellow deal of the race. That was a bad omen. Drivers inexperienced with road courses were going off and running into each other as well as many wrecks. For our gas stop tactics to work correct, we needed a long green flag run to the finish. The first seven laps was the longest green flag run of the race,” he said.

With cars crashing and pitting, Eric still charged to the front and led for five laps before pitting then having to re-start his charge toward the front.

Various problems caused the yellow flags to fly an additional five times. There were never more than three laps of racing between them. And at the reduced speeds, teams which had pitted early were fine on gas.

To end a tough weekend, with three laps to go, the spare transmission broke the same way the primary one had broken. Eric was running sixth at the time.

“I know the crew went from cheering for me, to being really frustrated” he said. “A tough weekend all and all for the #36 Whelen Motorsports team.

“We showed our speed in the race even with things against us. Sometimes racing goes this way, and with the #36 Monte Carlo being a new car this race, were bound to be better at Infineon Raceway in two weeks for the Camping World West race. We’ll give ‘em some reasons to cheer the next time.”

The good side of Eric’s weekend is that he has now led both of the two NASCAR races he’s driven.

“The NASCAR Camping World Series has some really tough competition. A lot of the current Sprint Cup drivers came to this series on their way up the ladder,” Eric noted.

“There were some young kids in the race who are being groomed by major NASCAR Sprint Cup teams to be future drivers - kids like Ryan Truex, who won today’s race on the last lap, and who drives for a team funded by Michael Waltrip,” Eric said.

Watch this Watkins Glen Camping World race today at 3p ET on Speed.

Eric is off to Infineon Raceway June 20^th to compete in the Camping World Series West race with the NASCAR Sprint Cup series. Entries in the race include the likes of Joey Logano and Boris Said.

Eric’s next race after that will be back at Watkins Glen, the SCCA World Challenge GT race on July 2 – 4, but this time in familiar confines of the Whelen Engineering Chevrolet Corvette, and this time on the 3.7-mile “long course.”