LAKEVILLE, Conn. — Immediately following the Memorial Day Grand Am GT event, Lime Rock Park closed for five weeks while major changes were made to the track.
The sweeping corner at the bottom of the Uphill was changed to a right-left-right complex, and another sweeper, West Bend, had the approach changed to slow the cars down before they dive down the hill that leads to the front straight. The entire track was milled down and repaved. While all the drivers appreciated the smoothness, many were outspoken about the changes, and they were not happy with them.
“Every year we come here, more than a million dollars in cars are torn up,” said Corvette driver Johnny O’Connell, who has been outspoken about the dangers of the track in his other career as a television commentator. “The track’s involvement with the sanctioning body and teams is lacking. But the asphalt is really good!”
 “West Bend was one of the best corners we had in the series and they took it away,” offered LMP1 winner Lucas Luhr. “I like the new pavement — less bumpy — but everything is covered with sand and mud.”
O’Connell added, “If you polled all the drivers and we had to drop one race, most drivers would say this one, and it’s only because it’s dangerous.”

• When practice started, the lap times started to come down by two or three seconds a lap, and officials discovered that drivers were cutting off the new corners, with all four wheels on the wrong side of the curbing. Between qualifying and the race, stacks of tires were strategically placed to force the drivers to stick to the track. Several drivers, including the LMP1 Audi of Emanuele Pirro, were penalized for shortcutting the course in qualifying.

• Speaking of penalties, the Andretti Green Acura was moved to the back of the grid due to the fact that driver Marco Andretti didn’t do any practice laps on Friday. Andretti was in Nashville, qualifying for the IRL race. Andretti was fastest in the morning warm-up and made headway to the front before turning over to co-driver Franck Montagny. The team finished seventh overall.

• This is Dyson Racing’s 25th anniversary in professional sports-car racing and before the start of the race, the organization was honored by IMSA. Rob Dyson brought out the Porsche 962 that Drake Olson drove to victory in the 1985 Camel GT event. Prior to the race, Rob took a lap in the 962, while being trailed by son Chris in the Porsche RS Spyder, which was painted in the color scheme from the 1985 race.  Former long-time Dyson Racing driver James Weaver, who retired after the 2006 season, was on hand for the celebration.