Mowlem's musings

Like so many before and after him, our autosport.com sportscar columnist had found his single-seater career grinding to a halt at an equally declining rate to his bank balance in the proceeding years. When he was offered a drive with the then AFN Porsche Eurotech team, he saw it as a potential springboard to a career in sportscars.

Seven years later and they are to be reunited in just such a place, the Le Mans Endurance Series race at Silverstone. And the car? What else but a Porsche GT3 RSR! The team, co-owned by Mike Jordan and David Warnock, is now know as JWR, but many of the same personnel remain from that all conquering 1997 year. Johnny understands the significance of his return to the team and although only recently returned from campaigning the ACEMCO Saleen at Mosport in the ALMS, he can't wait to get going...

I'm just back from Toronto and the last ALMS round where I drove the ACEMCO Saleen S7R with Terry Borcheller. It went pretty well I feel, especially as we finally seem to be laying to rest the niggling reliability issues that affected us at the last two rounds. These problems hit the whole team pretty hard, especially as they cost us at least one definite second place.

However, it's a true reflection of Jeff Giangrande's team that they have bounced back from every obstacle that's been put in front of them, and although we keep finishing on the podium, all of us are giving it 110% to move the programme forward so we can genuinely start challenging the factory Corvettes. I think even the Vette people would like nothing better, although I'm sure they'll be upset when we eventually beat them!

Mosport suited to our car, although I have to say that the two-lap qualifying rule hurts us a little more than most as the Saleen is very easy on it's front tyres in particular, so we lost those all important 0.4secs that would have kept the gap to the Vettes to under a second. Terry took the start although I'd qualified, because being the workaholic that he is, he had another race to do that afternoon.... in Cleveland!

He drove brilliantly for the first hour, but it still wasn't enough to hold on. I took over and just tried to bring the car home, as we experienced a couple of punctures, which was very unlucky. But the car ran like clockwork, and on my last stint the car really felt very comfortable, causing me to not even break too much of a sweat, which around the flat out in top gear twists of Mosport shows the car must have been good...believe me.

On the whole it was one of those uneventful races, which is exactly what we all needed. In nine days time I'm off to Road America, where I won last year, so I'm hopeful we can have another good result, but before then I've got to refocus on something that I haven't done in a few months... a 911 Porsche GT3RSR!

This weekend at the Silverstone Le Mans Endurance Series race, I'm going to be driving for the newly-formed JWR team, partnering one of the team principals, Mike Jordan. The team name may be new, but these are the same boys that ran me in 1997 when my whole sportscar career got kicked off, and led me to what I'm doing today. I'm proud to be able to drive not only for Mike again, but also with him. Back in 1997 his team not only gave me the equipment with which I could really shine, but Mike himself really went out of his way to help me adjust my driving style to a GT car. From his British GT exploits and his forays into the FIA GTs, he's certainly not as underestimated as he used to be in terms of his driving talent, but I know that most people are still unaware at just how good a race engineer he is as well.

It's strange how things come full circle, but now it's Mike's turn to push his team out there into the international Le Mans scene. He and his new partner; David Warnock, have big plans for their team and that includes the big one; the Le Mans 24 hours. I know that this year is just a stepping stone for them and their commercial partners into a full international programme next year and hopefully a Le Mans entry.

I also know from first hand experience that JWR wouldn't be doing this if they weren't deadly serious to do well. They're not going to want to be there just to say they were there. They are going to want to be contenders for class victory, and they have the wherewithal to achieve that. The past few seasons they've been gearing up for this moment, and now it's all coming together. Watch out for them both this year and next, they're going to be a seriously professional effort.

In the meantime, I'm just pleased to be able to race in my own country for a change, and if I can play a small part in helping them along the road to that international success, then I'll be only too pleased to help.... after all, I feel I owe 'em!