Long Beach. Long flight back. Not so bad going out, where did your day go coming home. Its a street course, something I used to like; now I am not so certain, narrow lanes affording little passing. Then there is the whole issue of the “main” series, the parade and posturing. I grew up in Illinois not terribly far from Indy, so the 500 is definitely something that I still appreciate. No idea why, though, it was killed in the mid 90′s when the most recent split happened. Yes, Paul Tracy won and was rooked; I’m a believer. Things seem to be better on 16th Street now though, new blood, old blood, a 2010 season with fewer ovals, turning right, you know…racing. Then again, I was there, sorry ABC shills; there were more people in the seats for the ALMS race on Saturday than the IndyCar race on Sunday..
Ok, enough bitching about IndyCar.
We flew into the Long Beach Airport (recommend) on Thursday afternoon and made it to our hotel around 3:54. Not quite in time for me to cab back over to the convention center for the 4PM photo meeting. On one hand, I had nothing better to do than sit by the bay drinking Cucapá Chupacabras and eating ceviche all evening. On the other, I was now faced with a 6:15Am photo meeting. It didn’t really matter since the time zone killed me. I was in bed around 8PM California time and back up at 4:30AM. The Passport Bus system didn’t start running until 6AM, so I had a cab waiting for me in the morning dark.
The Long Beach Convention Center is a huge place and I doubt I would have easily found the meeting if I had not run into Adriano Manocchia who showed me around the place for a bit. Could this place be any more cavernous and winding?
6:15AM photographer meeting
I shot a picture with my BlackBerry so you could the glamorous life of photo meetings. Having no real idea of where to go shoot after then meeting, I followed some good advice and headed to T11. The light was great, but I was outside the track and was not really liking the angle so I headed up the front straight to aquatint myself with T1, the Fountain Area and the rest of that side of the track. I imagine there might be a good shot or two in the street canyons over by the back straight, but I never made it over there as it did not look terribly interesting on the map. I spent a good portion of my Friday learning some of the holes and vantage points on the course; thinking about where the sun would be later in the day.
#45 Flying Lizard Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 RSR: Jorg Bergmeister, Patrick Long
Long Beach weekend is pretty heavy for ALMS. Friday morning practice, Friday afternoon qualification, Saturday afternoon race. Not much time to acclimate to a very slick and demanding street course. Not sure why they do it to be honest.
Since the race was only 100 minutes, I reasoned that I would not have time to shoot in the pits so I decided to work them during qualification. Similarly to Sebring, the light was long and colorful during quali. Also similar to Sebring was the extremely boring quali session. Again, the only highlight was the LMPC class battle with Christophe Bouchut and Gunnar Jeannette trading fast laps. I find it odd that the qualification can be so uninteresting when the race itself is full of excitement. Hopefully that will change as the season burns in.
#99 Green Earth Team Gunnar Oreca FLM09: Gunnar Jeannette, Elton Julian
Saturday was race day and I started the afternoon by shooting the start from atop the T1 walkway. Half of the walkway was dedicated to pros, half was sold to people who wanted the “pro” experience. My wife, Kim, commented later that half of the people shooting from above T1 left after the 1st 5 or 6 laps; I guess if you are paying to be up there, you need to get your shots.
Race Start #007 Aston Martin Racing Lola B09 60 Aston Martin: Harold Primat, Adrian Fernandez
I spent most of the ALMS race working the inside of the last few turns as I was liking the light on T9 and T10. I got some great shots in the hairpin, but had no idea the Pagenaud made that great pass on the final lap until I watched it later on the internet. Happily, the hat dance was modified from Sebring and went much more quickly. Unhappily, Long Beach did not let fans into the area to watch, so again, very few live people saw the trophies handed out.
Podium Ceremony GT Class Champagne Battle
Thanks for reading and looking! My ALMS Long Beach Grand Prix Photo Gallery is available for viewing and instant download at DPerceptions Motorsport Photography.
-Darren
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