Krohn Racing Notes & Quotes - Daytona Test Days

Daytona, January 9, 2011: The No. 76 Krohn Racing team has been testing the past two days at Daytona International Speedway in preparation for the Rolex 24 At Daytona, scheduled January 29-30, 2011. Below are a few notes and quotes from the team….

DRIVER QUOTES: TRACY W. KROHN, Team Owner/Driver No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola: “It’s really good this weekend. The track is much better since the repaving. It is certainly a smoother ride. You can put the car just about anywhere you want to on the banking. So that makes it more drivable. And there are some places you can put the car now that you couldn’t put it before, which will make it more competitive. I’m not sure that the track is necessarily faster. I think we’ve got pretty good air right now. That gives us a little more horsepower, so we’ll see how that is during the race. Our car is doing fine. We’re working on getting a set-up for the track and I think we’ve been chasing the track a little bit as we get more rubber down and get more grip, then have to change something else. I’m very pleased with the way the car is. It feels very solid on this track, very smooth. The infield is exactly the same so that hasn’t changed much except coming into Turn 1. It is much more drivable coming into Turn 1.Tthere’s a lot more you can do there. There’s a lot more grip. They’ve taken the crown out of that turn. There used to be a crown. If you got too far left the car would handle one way. If you got too far right it handled another way. But if you were right in the middle, it was just unpredictable. That was interesting. Overall I think it is a more fun track to drive.”

NIC JONSSON, Driver, No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola: So far everything has been going as planned. We have been breaking in all the stuff, the parts, which we are going to race at the (Rolex) 24. And now we are working on some of the performance of the car. Our new teammate, Nicolas Minassian, is a pure professional. He’s easy going and got up to speed very quickly in the car. It’s a great thing to have somebody with that experience, 24 hour experience more than anything, in the team, especially when it comes to the middle of the night during the 24hour. That’s going to be very critical to have those guys that have been doing it before, and with success, are going to be plugging a big hole for us with Krohn Racing. The crew has always done a fantastic job and has spent the last couple of days here. They’ve got everything done that the engineers have asked for and we’re just going to keep working on performance now and see if we can get some more speed out of the car. Ricardo Zonta is not here this weekend so we could give more testing time to Nicolas and Tracy. He will have no problem to be on the pace when he gets here race week.”

NICOLAS MINASSIAN, Driver, No. 76 Krohn Racing Ford Proto-Auto Lola: “It’s going just as it should go, very well. I’m enjoying the driving, which is always the main thing for me. I need to enjoy what I do. We are working on improving and I’m trying to learn. It’s always easy to go a certain lap time. It’s not difficult to get the last second out of it, so that’s what I’m working on for the next sessions. I will try to extract as much as I can from the car. Other than that, it’s all smooth. This is an endurance race so you need to take your time and not rush it into anything too much. I think it is going very well at the moment

Regarding driving on the Daytona International Speedway circuit for the first time ever: “I really love it. It’s really good. It’s a very good track for this kind of racing. There is enough space for traffic, for overtaking. I think the banking is something special, something different. I love that. It’s a one-of-a-kind sort of track. I enjoy every bit of everything. I’m happy.”

DAVID BROWN, Krohn Racing Team Manager and Engineer: “The car is performing well and we’re going in the right direction for the set-up. We are working through our Test plan and acclimatizing ourselves with the 2011 tires on the newly resurfaced Daytona track. We’ve gathered a great deal of information on both these subjects, which are helping us better understand the car and pursue a consistent race set-up for the 24 Hour.”

Krohn Racing’s fourth driver, Ricardo Zonta, is not present at this weekend’s test session but will be at the Daytona International Speedway for race week in late December.