O’Connell Delivers Detroit Sweep for Team Cadillac in Cadillac V-Series Challenge at Belle Isle

Mid-Race Pass Leads to Detroit Double for Johnny O; Pilgrim Solid in Fourth during Round 7 of Pirelli World Challenge Series

• * Wily Veteran Passes Porsche for Third Victory of Season
• * CTS-V Pushes Manufacturer Points Lead to Nine
• * O’Connell, Pilgrim Running Away with Driver Points

DETROIT – If you drive a Cadillac in the Pirelli World Challenge Series, there’s no place you’d rather win than in Detroit.

Johnny O’Connell and Team Cadillac did it twice in 24 hours.

“Maybe this is a good time to start talking about next year,” O’Connell cracked in Victory Lane, playing to a crowd that included General Motors President Mark Reuss, Cadillac VP of Performance Vehicles and Motorsports Jim Campbell, Cadillac Vice President of Marketing Don Butler, Cadillac Global Marketing Director Jim Vurpillat and Cadillac Director of Racing Mark Kent, among others.

“You always want to win in Detroit, especially when the president of General Motors comes up to you before the race and wishes you luck,” O’Connell said. “That doesn’t add any pressure at all. But we got it done in Detroit!”

O’Connell, by virtue of setting fastest race lap in Saturday’s event, started from the pole but lost out on the initial start to Lawson Aschenbach, who beat O’Connell’s No. 3 Cadillac CTS-V to Turn 1. From there, it was a waiting game, as O’Connell plotted his strategy.

“Sometimes racing is a chess match, where you’re studying one guy and he’s studying you,” O’Connell said. “There were two corners where I thought I was better than he was and one was the one where he made a mistake and allowed me to get by.”

“Once I got past I knew where I needed to focus on driving fast and once the tires started going off and he started coming back to me, I kind of thought he might get an opportunity to take a peek at me. He did, but again, it was knowing where to push and where not to because you can overdrive the car.”

O’Connell drove a technical race and kept the former Cadillac driver behind him the rest of the way. A crash in Turn 7 with less than 10 minutes remaining in the race sealed the deal, and O’Connell emerged with his third World Challenge GT Series victory of the season and the 46th of his career for Chevrolet and Cadillac.

“Talking with my engineer, knowing what we needed to do with it, and on top of that, the added weight (72 pounds) that we had to put in, there was no way I thought I was going to be able to hold onto that car,” O’Connell said later. “Athletically, it was trying to be just as soft with my inputs as I could, just slow and precise.”

It capped a dream weekend for the Cadillac program, with two victories and three podium finishes in the Motor City. It was the eighth podium finish for Team Cadillac in the 2012 season, and it increased Cadillac’s lead in the Manufacturer’s points to nine, 56-47, over Porsche with five races left in the season.

Andy Pilgrim started third in Sunday’s Round 7 and had a solid day, losing third on the start to the Volvo of Alex Figge and chasing him home in fourth.

”It was disappointing,” Pilgrim said after the race. “Alex got me on the start and they’ve got good power. I had a couple of times where I was side by-side with him, but I couldn’t get him. He drove a good race. Traffic played a part for both of us.

“It was a good race, great for the team, great for Johnny.”

O’Connell continues to lead the driver points over Pilgrim and the margin is now 128, 895-757. Aschenbach is back in third with 675 points.

James Sofronas rounded out the top five finishers, ahead of fellow Porsche drivers David Welch, Tomy Drissi and Madison Snow, the rebuilt Volvo of Randy Pobst and Tony Gaples’ Corvette.

Next action for Team Cadillac is June 20-22 at Canadian Tire Raceway in Bowmanville, Ontario.

Both races of the Cadillac V-Series Challenge from Detroit will be broadcast on NBC Sports, Saturday, July 7 at 5-7 p.m. EDT.

Cadillac V-Series Challenge in Detroit a ‘Home Game’ For Team Cadillac CTS-V Coupes

Enter Detroit Rounds 6-7 as Driver, Manufacturer Point Leaders

• * O’Connell, Pilgrim 1-2 in Driver Points, Cadillac Leads Manufacturers
• * Wet Weather Plagues Practice, Run-Up to Racing
• * Team Cadillac Races in Sight of Global HQ

DETROIT – Team Cadillac Racing returns to home ground this weekend for the Cadillac V-Series Challenge on the street course at Belle Isle, not far from its worldwide headquarters at the Renaissance Center.

If that’s not enough incentive for the twin Cadillac CTS-V Coupe race cars driven by Johnny O’Connell and Andy Pilgrim, then defending their winning streak on street courses could serve as well. And then, there’s the fact that Cadillac leads the manufacturers’ standings in the Pirelli World Challenge GT Series and O’Connell and Pilgrim are 1-2 in the driver standings.

In other words, there’s no pressure this weekend, right?

“Any time you’re doing a lap on the track and you can see headquarters, you know the boss is watching,” O’Connell joked. “It’s an important deal for us to get back here, since Cadillac is very involved in the promotion of this race. It’s a race track we expect to do well on.”

O’Connell won the first race of the season on the streets of St. Petersburg, Fla., and Pilgrim followed with a victory in the streets of Long Beach, Calif. Belle Isle’s 2.080-mile temporary course presents a different challenge, said Pilgrim.

“The thing with street courses is they have variables,” he said. “This is not St. Petersburg, and it’s not Long Beach. You’ve got concrete going to sealer, going to tarmac, going back to concrete, back to tarmac…you’ve got all sorts of surface changes here. When it rains, they have different grips. Sealant can be like ice in the wet, or it can be reasonable. Depends on what kind of sealant they use. Likewise, concrete, if it’s really smooth, can be very slick in the wet or it can be reasonable. You just don’t know.

“You don’t want to be the first one through the wet corners.”

With rain in the forecast Friday, there’s a chance that all the practice sessions Team Cadillac will have will be in wet conditions, and going from wet practice to dry racing conditions is a handful.

“There’s not much practice time, and it seems like all of our practice could be wet, so going from a wet practice to a dry race is going to put a ton of pressure on the team and the engineers to come up with something that can work in the race,” Pilgrim added.

That puts a premium on qualifying, set for 10:15 a.m. on Saturday.

“You have to qualify well,” O’Connell said. “The circuit is going to be very difficult for passing, so you need to be up near the front, the first two rows. Any time you are street racing, you have to come up with a good setup quickly, and you can’t allow yourself to overdrive the car to where you can hit a wall and take yourself out. It’s kind of a controlled aggressiveness.”

Pilgrim agreed.

“I think qualifying will be absolutely critical,” he said. “It’s supposed to rain this weekend, and that tends to favor the all-wheel-drive cars. I say this every week; if we come out of here with top-fives, then I’ll be happy. Street races…get out of one street race alive is good, get out of two street races alive is even better. Street races are tough, we can be fast here, I believe, if we can get a setup.”

Getting that ideal setup is going to be critical to the success of Team Cadillac this weekend, O’Connell said.

“The Cadillac is a long-wheelbase car and it’s heavy,” he said. “On the higher-speed circuits, you expect to do well. On street courses, we were thinking that if we got on the podium we were doing great. I think we surprised ourselves with our performance at St. Pete and Long Beach, but this is one of the tracks that might favor the all-wheel-drive cars or the Porsches because of the shorter wheelbase. You never know what’s going to happen, but we expect to do well because we’re Cadillac.”

The Cadillacs have done well this season, earning two victories in the season’s first five races. O’Connell leads Pilgrim by 14, 573-559, in the driver point standings. Volvo’s Randy Pobst, winner at Laguna Seca Raceway last time out, is third with 502.

In the Manufacturer’s race, Cadillac stands four points higher than Porsche, 37-33, after five races. Volvo leaped into the battle in third place with 25 points.

The Cadillac V-Series Challenge will kick off Saturday at 2:45 p.m. EDT for Round 6 and at 11:45 a.m. on Sunday for Round 7. Both races will be streamed live and will be broadcast on NBC Sports, Saturday, July 7 at 5-7 p.m. EDT.

Team Cadillac Finishes First, Third in Cadillac V-Series Challenge Race at Belle Isle in Detroit

O’Connell Wins, Pilgrim Third in Round 6 of Pirelli World Challenge Series

• * Start-Line Crash Enables O’Connell to Get Away Clean
• * Cadillac Increases Lead in Manufacturer Points
• * O’Connell, Pilgrim Still 1-2 in Driver Points at Halfway

DETROIT – In the shadow of Cadillac’s headquarters, Johnny O’Connell delivered a homecoming victory for Team Cadillac in the Cadillac V-Series Challenge on Saturday at Belle Isle.

O’Connell led all 22 laps in his No. 3 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe and earned his second victory of the 2012 season in the Pirelli World Challenge GT Series, and teammate Andy Pilgrim wound up third in his No. 8 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe.

The race itself started with a bang, as polesitter Randy Pobst’s Volvo suffered a mechanical problem on the standing start. O’Connell leaped away into the lead, while Pilgrim and eventual runner-up Lawson Aschenbach struggled to miss the stationary vehicle.

Aschenbach got through first and took off after O’Connell, with Pilgrim sliding into third.

Nearly the entire field missed Pobst’s car, which had broken a driveshaft, but the GTS cars of Roger Miller and Bill Ziegler did not. The impact sent the Volvo left to the wall, where it was hit by rookie Robert Stout.

Pobst and the other three drivers emerged unhurt, but the accident required significant cleanup. The race finally went green on lap 12.

O’Connell immediately started putting distance on Aschenbach over the next five laps until another crash on lap 17 put the field back under yellow.

The cleanup for that accident put the race over the 50-minute time limit, and O’Connell took the white and checkered flags while under the caution.

“When you’re racing in front of headquarters, you want to do well,” O’Connell said. “This was a race that in many respects was won in qualifying. I really put in one of my better laps this morning in qualifying and that allowed us to get on the front row.”

On the initial standing start, O’Connell launched well and concentrated on the first turn, but noticed that Pobst hadn’t moved.

“Out of my peripheral vision, I saw that Randy didn’t go, and I knew that was a bad thing for him,” he said. “When I got to Turn 2, I took my first good look around. Lawson was the only one there.”

That was the race, for all intents and purposes. Pilgrim kept the top two cars honest, and the top three pulled away by about eight seconds in the five laps of green-flag racing they managed before the second yellow flag ended the day.

It’s a bonus for O’Connell for tomorrow’s 50-minute race as well. He set the fastest lap of the day on Saturday, earning the pole for Sunday’s race. Pilgrim will start third behind Aschenbach’s Porsche.

It was an interesting start for Pilgrim, as he was directly behind Pobst when the latter’s car broke on the start.

“I was lucky to miss Randy,” he said. “On the standing start, when somebody stalls, you’re just thankful to get by. Lawson got a great start, and I’m really glad I didn’t hit Lawson, because he went right and I went left. We could have come together right in the middle and that would have been really bad.”

Pilgrim said that the lack of green-flag racing was a shame, and that the Detroit crowd would see better action from the Pirelli World Challenge Series on Sunday.

“It’s a shame for the fans, and we will do better,” he vowed. “We have a great racing series, and I hope they stick with us and we’ll give them a much better show tomorrow.”

For Cadillac fans, and the hundreds of employees, family and friends who attended the Cadillac V-Series Challenge, it was a pretty good show all around, with the victory and a double podium.

The victory, Cadillac’s third in six races so far this year, gave Cadillac a six-point lead over Porsche in the Manufacturer’s points, and O’Connell stretched his driver points lead to 72, 735-663, over his teammate Pilgrim.

After O’Connell, Aschenbach and Pilgrim came the Volvo of Alex Figge and Steve Ott’s Porsche in the top five. David Welch, James Sofronas, Tomy Drissi, Madison Snow and Anders Hainer rounded out the top 10. All but Hainer (Audi) among the second five were Porsche drivers.

Round 7 of the Pirelli World Challenge Series will take place Sunday at 12:05 p.m. on the 2.080-mile Belle Isle street course. Both races will be streamed live and will be broadcast on NBC Sports, Saturday, July 7 at 5-7 p.m. EDT.

Plenty of Fun for Entire Family; Q&A Sessions with Team Chevy Drivers, Including Pole-Sitter Ryan Briscoe and 2012 3-time Race-Winner Will Power

DETROIT – Race fans visiting Indianapolis Motor Speedway this weekend for the Indianapolis 500 will have the opportunity to experience the Team Chevy Racing Display, filled with show cars, production vehicles, Chevrolet Performance Parts crate engines, parts and accessories, test drive Chevy’s new lineup and participate in question-and-answer sessions with Team Chevy drivers Ryan Briscoe, Will Power, Ed Carpenter, JR Hildebrand, Rubens Barrichello, Tony Kanaan, EJ Viso, James Hinchcliffe, Ana Beatriz, Ryan Hunter-Reay, Marco Andretti and Sebastian Saavedra.

“The Team Chevy Racing Display will have something for everyone in the family – including appearances by Team Chevy IZOD IndyCar Series drivers who will be racing in the Indianapolis 500 and the opportunity to compete with other fans on video race simulators,” said Terry Dolan, Manager, Chevy Racing. “Fans will also have the opportunity to experience Chevrolet’s newest cars, trucks and crossover vehicles, including a fan favorite – the Corvette 427 60th Anniversary Edition. They can spend time with product specialists in the display to learn more about Chevrolet’s lineup, and also check out Chevrolet Performance Parts crate engines and an assortment of accessories and performance parts that fans can purchase from their local Chevy dealer. IMS is a special place, and we look forward to seeing race fans during their visit to the track.”

The Team Chevy Racing Display – where fans can see and learn more about vehicles like Sonic 5-Door, Camaro 45th Anniversary, Silverado Crew 1500, Cruze ECO, Traverse LTZ, Equinox 2LT, Tahoe 4WD LTZ, Corvette Grand Sport Convertible, Corvette Coupe, Sonic Sedan, Malibu ECO, Camaro SS Coupe, Camaro Convertible, Silverado 2500 HD, Silverado ZL1 Short Bed, Cruze LTZ, Volt and Suburban ½ Ton – will be located near the museum, and will be open 8 a.m.-6 .m. on Thursday, 8 a.m.-5 p.m. on Friday, 8 a.m.-6 p.m. on Saturday, and 7 a.m.-12 p.m. on Sunday.

Past and current Indianapolis 500 pace cars – including the 2013 Chevrolet Corvette ZR1 – also will be on display.

Fans who sign up with Team Chevy will receive a special Chevrolet t-shirt.

Fans can test drive Sonic 5-Door, Cruze ECO, Malibu, Volt, Camaro SS, Camaro Convertible, Corvette Grand Sport Convertible, Equinox LT, Traverse LT and Silverado 1500. The Team Chevy Test Drive, which will be located adjacent to the display, will be open from 8 a.m.-5:30 p.m. on Thursday, and from 8 a.m. – 5 p.m. on both Friday and Saturday.

Oriol Servia will participate in a question-and-answer session at the Team Chevy display at 9:30 a.m. on Friday. Ed Carpenter will make an appearance at 1:30 p.m., followed by JR Hildebrand at 3 p.m., 2012 Indianapolis 500 pole-sitter Ryan Briscoe and three-time 2012 IndyCar race winner Will Power at 3:15 p.m., Rubens Barrichello at 3:30 p.m., Tony Kanaan at 3:45 p.m. and EJ Viso at 4 p.m.

James Hinchcliffe and Ana Beatriz will be at the display at 8:15 a.m. on Saturday, followed by Ryan Hunter-Reay and Marco Andretti at 2:15 p.m. and Sebastian Saavedra at 2:45 p.m.

Also, Chevrolet is supporting Cell Phones for Soldiers by providing locations at the display for drop boxes. Cell Phones for Soldiers raises money through the collection of gently used cell phones, and has provided since 2004 more than 1 million pre-paid calling cards and 60 million minutes of calling time to soldiers overseas. For more information, please visit www.chevrolet.com/phones.

New Hudson-based Pratt Miller is wildly famous as an auto supplier and aftermarket and motor racing firm, but its perhaps less famous as a defense contractor.

Nonetheless, P&M has been making great strides on the defense industry front.

Just last week at the big, two-day NDIA/Michigan Defense Industrial Base Expo at Macomb College in Warren, Pratt Miller had a recruiting booth among 30 or more contractors displaying at the show.

Staffing the booth for Pratt were recruiter Sandy McKinnon and Sara Blackmer, director, Government Markets.

Blackmer discussed Pratt Miller’s progression from being an original auto supplier to now both auto and military.

Asked if there was synergy between auto and defense for P&M, she said, “There’s absolutely synergy.

“Pratt Miller Engineering’s heritage is in motorsports, we’ve been exclusive to GM Racing since 2005.

“From that winning tradition that we have, we’ve been able to translate some of the smart technologies into advanced automotive, and also defense applications.

“So, vehicle lightweighting, reliability, durability, rugged-izing things like suspensions, redesigning chassis and body work are the kinds of things we do for vehicles.”

Pratt Miller’s engineering and analysis work for defense includes a wide range of tools including packaging/architecture design, 3D Solids/Parametric CAD, reverse engineering, industrial design, structure optimization, weight reduction, durability/fatigue analysis and much more.

Their defense applications apply to Tactical Wheeled Vehicles, Tracked Vehicles, Robotics/Unmanned Systems, Trailers, Fleet Resetting, Missile Systems and the like.

“So our facility is soup to nuts: clean-sheet design, to development, to concepting and prototype manufacturing.

“We do not do commodity work, we also do not do volume-anything. But if you’re looking for a full-system prototype or a piece-part prototype, we can absolutely do that. Small quantity volume we can do.”

Asked which was busier, defense or automotive, Blackmer replied:

“We started as racing, we’ve been in racing since 1989 but exclusive to GM since 2005.”

“We still do probably 60 percent of our business is racing, and the other 40 percent is split between advanced automotive and defense.

“Say it’s more defense this year than automotive, but that fluctuates depending on market needs.”

From Badboyvettes.com:

It was announced at the 2012 New York Auto Show that the Viper would return to ALMS competition some time in 2012, and full season 2013 with a 2 car full factory effort team.

Here are the facts:

• -ACO regulations define the minimum engine displacement as 5.5L, but have given SRT Viper a waiver to run a 8.0L engine. This is not an ALMS only waiver, this is a full ACO waiver.
• -SRT Motorsports is partnering with Roush Industries on the development of the 8.0L V10.
• -As of the announcement, Riley Technologies had no real race cars built yet.
• -Other than 3 drivers, Kuno Wittmer, Dominik Farnbacher and Marc Goossens, there is no team in place yet.

As for the engine, this is obviously a sore spot in everyone’s side, especially since Corvette was forced from 7.0L down to 6.0L then down to 5.5L. Our guess is that they will be restricted on revs, as well as intake size, and probably weight for at least a while until their true performance is observed. But with operating at lower revs, means less wear and tear on the engine. This is exactly what the 5.5L rule was made to prevent.

In addition, it has also been rumored that SRT has been in talks with the FIA and ACO to change the GTE regulations for 2014 to allow up to 8.0L. Since Oreca, the French motorsport company, isn’t running the program this time, we are not sure if the French will want to make that drastic of a change to its most balanced class.

Of course this isn’t the first Viper to race in the ALMS in recent years. The Primetime Viper from a few season back was heavily restricted. So much so that they could not be competitive even mid-pack. But on the other hand they were not a factory effort.

SRT has not said it directly, but we know their main goal is to beat Corvette. They have taken a few small stabs at GM/Corvette here and there, but no blood has been drawn…yet.

Graham Henckel – Chief Engineer for SRT Viper claims they will not put the SRT badge on anything that isn’t racetrack proven. Our question is: How many races have the Jeep, Ram, Neon, Charger, 300, Crossfire, and Caliber entered or won?

As for Corvette…..do we really need to make a list?

Regardless, we welcome the competition. The more competition there is, the better the victories are.

http://badboyvettes.com/695

Pilgrim Podiums for Team Cadillac; CTS-V Coupe Still Leads Manufacturer, Driver Points in World Challenge

O’Connell Finishes 7th in Cadillac Sports Car Grand Prix of Monterey

• – Team Cadillac Drivers 1-2 in Driver Points after 5 Races
• – Pilgrim Holds Off Porsche for Podium Finish
• – Detroit Up Next on World Challenge Series Schedule

MONTEREY, Calif. – Andy Pilgrim had to keep track of a lot of information in the closing laps of Friday’s Cadillac Sports Car Grand Prix at Laguna Seca Raceway.

Chief among them was the position of one Lawson Aschenbach.

Aschenbach, who had to start 15th in the field because he missed qualifying, rocketed through the field to fourth place late in the 50-minute Pirelli World Challenge Series event on the 2.238-mile layout, and had he passed Pilgrim in the final four laps, he would have wrested the Manufacturer’s point lead from Team Cadillac.

He didn’t, and Pilgrim hung on to finish third in his No. 8 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe, keeping Cadillac’s lead intact and cutting the distance to the driver point lead to just 14 points.

“Manufacturer points is all we care about,” an enthused Pilgrim said on the podium after the race.

Pilgrim had a couple of chances to put a car between himself and Aschenbach, but missed by inches on both. The Volvos of race winner Randy Pobst and second-place Alex Figge were just too stout off the corners to get it done.

“It was an elastic band effect with Volvo,” Pilgrim said. “They were slow going into the corners and rockets coming out. I had the best shot on restarts, to try and get Alex. He was very clean; we were bumping, but it was clean. He gave me room and I gave him room. But once I got to the end of the corner, they took off. “

Having that buffer between himself and Aschenbach was tops in his mind.

“I tried, really, because I wanted to put him [Figge] between me and Lawson,” Pilgrim said. “Having Lawson behind me, holy smoke…I had to just be perfect for those four or five laps at the end. Luckily, we were. It just really kept me focused. Lawson raced me fair and really close.”

Pilgrim said he had an advantage on Aschenbach under braking with his Brembo brake system.

“The brakes on our car made it for us. He didn’t make anything on us on brakes.”

Pobst ran away with the victory, crossing the line .699 seconds ahead of his teammate, Figge. Pilgrim was third, 1.58 seconds back, and Aschenbach came home fourth, 1.711 seconds behind.

Johnny O’Connell had rough going in the No. 3 Cadillac CTS-V Coupe, starting seventh and finishing there. He was carrying 196 pounds of sanctioning-body-mandated weight, and had a struggle to stay with the lead group.

O’Connell, a master of the restart, had a couple of chances on late restarts to improve his position, but couldn’t close the deal before Turn 3.

Despite the extra weight he carried, O’Connell was pleased with the day.

“Restarts were good today,” he said. “The guys did an amazing job; the race car was the best car I had all weekend. But that much weight was murder here. Not just in the momentum I had to carry up the hill, but in the way my car was handling. You want to win, but you’re glad that Andy had a really good run in third. It was a good event for Cadillac.”

After Pobst, Figge, Pilgrim and Aschenbach came the Porsche of Steve Ott to round out the top five. Mike Skeen came from 16th to finish sixth, followed by O’Connell and the Porsches of Justin Marks, Tomy Drissi and Bret Curtis.

O’Connell still leads the driver points by 14, 573-559, over Pilgrim, with Pobst now third at 502. James Sofronas, who was third coming in, retired midway through Friday’s race and finished 15th in GT. Aschenbach is fourth at 427.

In the Manufacturer’s race, Cadillac doubled its lead from Utah and stands four points higher than Porsche, 37-33, after five races. Volvo leaped into the battle in third place, with 25 points.

Next race for Team Cadillac is on home turf June 1-3 at the Cadillac Detroit Grand Prix on the Belle Isle course in the middle of the Detroit River.

Friday’s Cadillac Sports Car Grand Prix of Monterey is set for broadcast May 27 at 11 p.m. EDT on the NBC Sports Network.

View live streaming on the day of the races and continuously on demand after races.