Mowlem's Mid-Ohio musings

I was pleased we were quickest in GTS in the race morning warm-up, although I knew it didn't really count for much, even if we were running full tanks, but it was still a good start to the day. Terry (Borcheller, my team-mate) would start, and he had a really good first stint, despite a problem developing with the car. He almost hung on to the Corvettes from the start, but then basically they started pulling away at around a second a lap.

After a little over an hour Terry followed Ollie Gavin into the pits, and then the caution flags came out. Ron Fellows pitted a lap later, and gained over a minute. Terry had been explaining that there was a problem with the car during his stint, and when I left the pits on cold tyres, the Saleen felt very nervous. I told team manager Jim Bell what it felt like, and he called me back in, while we were still under the yellow. Having already lost a lap to Ron Fellows in the #3 Corvette, now suddenly we were two laps down - the team having to replace the left rear toe link, which it did very quickly.

The car felt better, but it was still a little edgy, to say the least! Then we had more drama: Olivier Beretta in the #4 Corvette came up behind me. I didn't want to make it too easy for him, even if he was lapping me, but I never defended the racing line. I just drove as fast and clean as I could, in my efforts to catch the Lamborghini.

After a couple of laps he obviously decided he couldn't pass me cleanly - which bodes well for the future - and gave me a big tap up the rear into the last corner. At this point I radioed in and the team told me to move over and let him by. So into the next hairpin I braked earlier, as the Saleen is better on the brakes than the Corvette, and stayed on the racing line to the left...and he just drove straight down the right-hand side of me! Fortunately for me I hadn't begun to turn-in otherwise he would have broken my steering, but it was still enough to send me straight off into the gravel.

I gunned it through the gravel trap and kept it going for a lap and everything seemed ok, but then the bonnet flew off! At the final refuelling stop, I kept the same set of tyres on. This turned out to be a very good team decision, because if I'd lost another 20 seconds, I may not have caught Brabs in the Lambo, even with new rubber.

The dramas weren't over however, because after leaving the pits (for the fourth time!), the traction control failed, and the resultant 'misfire' felt like I had the pit lane speed limiter on all the time! It took me a couple of corners to work out that it was the traction control causing the problem. I switched the traction control off, which left me full of fuel, on tyres that had done a stint, and no traction control - lovely!

At this point Jim Bell kindly pointed out over the radio that I was going to have to do high 1m21s or low 1m22s every lap to the end if we were to stand a chance of catching Brabs for third.

So I drove my heart out. Jim and the team did a fantastic job over the radio to keep me fired up, not that I needed it after the Beretta incident! I was taking big risks in traffic to try and keep the pressure and when the gap got to five seconds with five minutes left, I asked over the radio how badly the team wanted third place, and the answer came back: "Very badly!"

I caught David and went for the move at the first opportunity. Despite the extra drag of the missing bonnet, I towed up to him down the back straight and went around the outside of him into Turn 3. It was a great chase from inside the car: I hope it was almost as exciting for people watching. Apparently we got an awful lot of TV coverage through our on-board camera. Someone said they watched me on the in-car camera, and thought I looked very relaxed. Determined maybe, but not relaxed!

Hats off to Pirelli, I ran 105 minutes on the same set of tyres, pressing on the whole time, but especially in the last hour and fair play to the Krohn/Barbour team and their Lamborghini, there's little doubt that they will be challenging us very soon.

The whole team was delighted with third place - especially after a sequence of niggly problems - and Jeff was especially pleased, as much for his whole team, as for himself. He's a real sports car enthusiast through and through, and it's great to be able to deliver in some small way for him and the team. There is a terrific team spirit within ACEMCO Motorsport, and that is really helping to carry us all forward.

There's no time for any development work now: it's just racing. I've never been to Lime Rock Park, so I've no idea if that track will suit us this weekend. Terry thinks that we could surprise the C5-Rs. Apparently all we have to do is run troublefree and not get hit by anyone.

One things for sure, I know that we'll all be trying our very hardest - again!