Krohn Racing Daytona January test 2010-01-11

Krohn Racing Daytona Test Weekend Report

The Krohn Racing team participated in the official Grand-Am Test Days in preparation for the Rolex 24 At Daytona endurance race this week. Owner/driver Tracy W. Krohn drove the No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola, along with co-drivers Nic Jonsson and Colin Braun. Ricardo Zonta sat out this weekend's test session but will join the team for the twice-around-the-clock race January 30-31, 2010.

TRACY W. KROHN, Team Owner/Driver No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Lola:

Regarding the test and weather conditions:
"We had two fairly good sessions. The car got better and better and more drivable. There's a little bit of a balance between getting Nic and Colin and myself all on the same page but I think we're there. I think the car was getting better and gaining grip. Certainly having a warmer session on Sunday was advantageous for everybody but I thought we made a huge amount of gain in the level of grip we were getting just for the weather."

"I don't know anybody that's ever seen snow and sleet in Daytona, if that's an indicator. We just want to strike a happy median. We assume the weather won't be the same for the race as it was for testing. The car is in very good position and we feel like we could go racing now."

NIC JONSSON, Driver, No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Lola:

Regarding the test and weather conditions:
"Unfortunately we didn't get as many laps as we would have liked to have done this weekend. We had a few small issues that may have been due to weather conditions. Saturday we were pretty much parked all day because of the weather conditions. I think we have a pretty good idea of what needs to be done when we come back here. We've obviously done this race several times before and we've run pretty successfully here in the past, so I don't think there's much concern about that. The weather hasn't really helped since we've been at the freezing point or below most of the time. It's one of the coldest I've ever been to as an official test here at Daytona or anywhere else in the world actually and I'm from Sweden. I've done some really early spring testing over in Europe before that was like this type of weather but never in the States, that's for sure. It's put a damper on the testing. But, I'm looking real positive on coming back in three weeks and I think we should have a fantastic 24 Hour race.

COLIN BRAUN, Driver, No. 75 Krohn Racing Ford Lola:

Regarding the test:
"The test went really good, I think. I got quite a few laps in the car...enough to certainly get comfortable. I was surprised the car was pretty easy to drive and pretty easy to adapt to for me. After a few laps we were close in the speed and after a few more we were pretty quick. I think we've got a good, solid car. These guys have done a really good job developing it over the last couple of years where you can just get in it and it drives really well right off the bat. It makes it a lot of fun and makes it easy for me coming in here knowing we've got a good car."

Regarding the weather conditions:
"The weather this whole weekend has really been a struggle. We struggled to get tire temps, obviously, in the car and that really tends to slow your testing down when you have to go out five or six laps before you make a change, instead of being able to go out and make a couple of laps and make a change. It really slows the test down, not to mention the weather obviously being bad with the rain and the snow and the sleet. It put a big damper in the amount of time we had on the race track. I think that's going to help us though because we have a really good base set-up anyway. We just have a couple of things we want to run through and I think we can do that when we come back for the race."

DAVID BROWN, Krohn Racing Team Manager and Engineer:
"We completed our test program even though the elements conspired against us. We came away from the test having gotten Colin comfortable and up to speed, Tracy reacquainted with the car after a couple of months and Nic doing just a few laps in continuation of our testing. We had a couple of issues which we need to address and we look forward very much to the 24-hour race."

-source: kr