IMSA Team Falken memories.

TRspitfirefan · 2 Oct 2015, 00:13 (Ref:3578739)

Great article from Racer.com.
http://www.racer.com/imsa/item/12221...alken-memories
Really sad to see Team Falken come to an end.

My favorite memory as a fan of Team Falken, was from 2013.
I was fortunate enough to get to attend their paddock tour at Road America during the August round, which was really cool. But it also made it even more heart breaking a few weeks later when the car was written off during the start of that awful Baltimore race. It was almost painful watching the team struggle through the next few rounds, trying to get the old 2010 car up to speed, especially when the car was even off the pace during one rainy session at Cota.
We hadn't been planning on attending Petit Lemans, but thankfully my brother decided that missing the last opportunity to see the classic ALMS race, was just not an option. Besides, after so many great memories following the ALMS over the years, we kind of felt obligated to see its last event. So we loaded up my rusty twenty year old Dodge Caravan and set off on the eight hundred mile road trip, hoping and praying the old girl wouldn't let us down. She didn't.
Road Atlanta is such a beautiful track and the whole event was incredible.
Night racing, racing in the rain, red clay mud, it was all just plain awesome.
We closely followed the progress of the #17 car during the race, keeping track of their position by calling home and getting timing updates. I remember how exciting it was when they managed to claw their way back onto the GT class lead lap. They were far from the fastest car that weekend, but it was with a little attrition, some luck, some pretty crazy driving and a ton of sheer determination they were able to win that race. And I was there to witness it!
I will always remember the never give up attitude of the little Falken Team.

Good Times..Thanks for the memories.

Deleted · 2 Oct 2015, 00:29 (Ref:3578741)

Their rep lady that visited this forum answering and reporting was rare a jewel in the stock.

The trick they pulled out at Mid-Ohio '11 is my favorite GT moment of all after the death of LMGT1 and succumb of LMGT2, ie in the last 4 years. Funny and emotional at the same time, cannot imagine a better way to portrait tire technology! Hope they realized to put this pr to good use.

#post 6666

MoMedic9019 · 2 Oct 2015, 01:04 (Ref:3578744)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chiana

Their rep lady that visited this forum answering and reporting was rare a jewel in the stock.

The trick they pulled out at Mid-Ohio '11 is my favorite GT moment of all after the death of LMGT1 and succumb of LMGT2, ie in the last 4 years. Funny and emotional at the same time, cannot imagine a better way to portrait tire technology! Hope they realized to put this pr to good use.

#post 6666

It was Kelly Broulliet. She's now running KBru Comm and is doing quite fab a job.

Deleted · 2 Oct 2015, 01:13 (Ref:3578745)

Apparently she really likes dinosaurs* and sharks. My sort of girl

(hopefully reference to the biological non-avian kind, not DPs

)

Mechanic Z · 2 Oct 2015, 01:18 (Ref:3578746)

Quote:

Originally Posted by TRspitfirefan

Great article from Racer.com.
http://www.racer.com/imsa/item/12221...alken-memories
Really sad to see Team Falken come to an end.

My favorite memory as a fan of Team Falken, was from 2013.
I was fortunate enough to get to attend their paddock tour at Road America during the August round, which was really cool. But it also made it even more heart breaking a few weeks later when the car was written off during the start of that awful Baltimore race. It was almost painful watching the team struggle through the next few rounds, trying to get the old 2010 car up to speed, especially when the car was even off the pace during one rainy session at Cota.
We hadn't been planning on attending Petit Lemans, but thankfully my brother decided that missing the last opportunity to see the classic ALMS race, was just not an option. Besides, after so many great memories following the ALMS over the years, we kind of felt obligated to see its last event. So we loaded up my rusty twenty year old Dodge Caravan and set off on the eight hundred mile road trip, hoping and praying the old girl wouldn't let us down. She didn't.
Road Atlanta is such a beautiful track and the whole event was incredible.
Night racing, racing in the rain, red clay mud, it was all just plain awesome.
We closely followed the progress of the #17 car during the race, keeping track of their position by calling home and getting timing updates. I remember how exciting it was when they managed to claw their way back onto the GT class lead lap. They were far from the fastest car that weekend, but it was with a little attrition, some luck, some pretty crazy driving and a ton of sheer determination they were able to win that race. And I was there to witness it!
I will always remember the never give up attitude of the little Falken Team.

Good Times..Thanks for the memories.

Petit '13 was my best crazy idea ever. Great memories.

MaskedRacer · 2 Oct 2015, 01:26 (Ref:3578748)

Saw the Watkins Glen race this year. The Falken car was running the back of the back of the GTLM during the second hour. By the third hour they got up to about 3rd I think. But then the rain came in hour 4 and then it took the lead and it was the fastest car out there in class for sure. Only the DP cars were faster overall in fact. I think that was Sellers driving at the time too. Just a solid steady race for them.

Mechanic Z · 2 Oct 2015, 01:34 (Ref:3578750)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chiana

Their rep lady that visited this forum answering and reporting was rare a jewel in the stock.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MoMedic9019

It was Kelly Broulliet. She's now running KBru Comm and is doing quite fab a job.

Agreed, Kelly did awesome work with Falken, and continues to do awesome work for her teams now. Plus, she's always friendly and takes time to talk at the track. One of the fan-friendliest people in racing.

Deleted · 2 Oct 2015, 02:07 (Ref:3578752)

Darren Cox could learn a thing or million from her!

MoMedic9019 · 2 Oct 2015, 03:04 (Ref:3578758)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chiana

Darren Cox could learn a thing or million from her!

Darren is actually a really nice person.... he's not the giant jerk some make him out to be. Very, very dry sense of humor. I digress...

My favorite memory was them winning Petit with with shark car.

Mechanic Z · 2 Oct 2015, 03:14 (Ref:3578759)

Falkenstein was the best!
Here's the Falken video from Mid-Ohio 2011.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCHuzLkOrZo

YZFrider · 2 Oct 2015, 04:39 (Ref:3578766)

Why oh why! Definitely gonna miss Falken, the show they would give when everyone counted them out and they find a way to come back and pull off stunning victories. Here's to them to go out with a win at Petit

TRspitfirefan · 2 Oct 2015, 13:08 (Ref:3578836)

From SC365.
http://sportscar365.com/imsa/tusc/te...s-final-start/

rwintle · 2 Oct 2015, 13:47 (Ref:3578844)

Yup, very sad to see this end.

We never saw the Black Swan/Falken Ford GT in the ALMS up here in Canada - for whatever reason(s), Tim Pappas et al. never brought the car to Mosport. Lots of good memories of the Falken Porsche though. And that livery... just gorgeous on anything.

Mosport 2011:

Team Falken Tire, Mobil 1 Grand Prix of Mosport by Richard Wintle, on Flickr

And 2012:

GT pack, turn 10, Mosport by Richard Wintle, on Flickr

I suspect a certain percentage of race fans will also miss the Falken Tires "representatives" in the paddock. You all know what I'm talking about.

Artur · 2 Oct 2015, 22:54 (Ref:3578956)

Very sad to see another team leaving specially such a friendly and likeble one.

Still, this was sort of inevitable to me. It even surprised me how Sumitomo have kept it for so long.

Michelin and Bridgestone are way ahead of any other tire manufacturer and spends +€650m, annually, on R&D. GoodYear, which is the 3rd, spends only €350m, 4th Continental => €220m, Pirelli=>€200m, Sumitomo=>€175m, Hankook=>€150m, Yokohama=>€105m

On Super GT, Yokohama and Dunlop(brand owned by Sumitomo in Japan, and GoodYear elsewhere) needs to pay for the few teams to run on their slower tires. The thing is that GTLM is different than SGT where WH applies to individual cars instead of brands(and latter in the seasons, the Bridgestone and Michelin cars are so weight handicaped that the others can get good results out of it).

Falken should have done what Dunlop(and others) have done before and gone with a unique car. That way, the BoP would compensante for any tire deficit and they would get good results much more often. I guess they just couldn't partner with an exclusive manufacturer and had to stick with the Porsche.

Deleted · 2 Oct 2015, 23:22 (Ref:3578959)

Sure affiliating yourself with unique model would have handed them moar bop opportunities (not that 991 or post-2010 GT3-RSRs have really had issues on being benefactors on that front...) however it wouldn't have told anything about the tires itself. You could have praised or blamed the performance purely because of chosen chassis. Or the chassis maker could have suffered if all the attention was going to the choice of tires.

When you have diferent tires makers within known chassis, that is the only way to judge the true performance of tires.

I would judge Falkens from LMGTE experience
- Wet weather EXCELLENT
- Dry weather AVERAGE
- Traditional circuits AVERAGE
- Street circuits GOOD

I couldn't judge mass choice Michelins of all the others ... or when BMW only had Dunlops. Not specifically.

fieldodreams79 · 5 Oct 2015, 16:44 (Ref:3579759)

My favorite memories for this team are PLM 2012 and 2013.

2012, Kelly was offering tours of the team's paddock and myself and several other 10thers got an up close look and special tour from Mr. Sellers and Mr. Ragginger:
http://falkenalms.blogspot.com/2012_10_01_archive.html

I took my son to the first day of practice in 2013 (when they actually ran on Wednesday) and the then 7 year old said his favorite car was "the one with the teeth."

Me too, boy, me too!

TBH, I'll miss the Falken Tire girls, too.

WolfsburgRS · 6 Oct 2015, 20:18 (Ref:3580069)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Artur

Falken should have done what Dunlop(and others) have done before and gone with a unique car. That way, the BoP would compensante for any tire deficit and they would get good results much more often. I guess they just couldn't partner with an exclusive manufacturer and had to stick with the Porsche.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Mark Richter from Falken before the program was announced at a media event and he had said they went with Porsche because of the prestige, history, and proven chassis. Basically that they wanted to focus on developing tires, not a whole car, and that the Porsche was the best option from a customer program standpoint.

My favorite memories were undoubtedly the two wins here at Baltimore. Plenty of other good ones at Lime Rock, VIR and of course Sebring, but those two wins were just fantastic.

Nick Woodbury · 7 Oct 2015, 00:19 (Ref:3580117)

I guess I should offer up some photo memories.
The first picture is from the 2012 Northeast Grand Prix at Lime Rock Park.

Second is from the 2011 Northeast Grand Prix, hehe.

And of course, how could we ever forget their lovely grid girls?

(2012 LRP Grid-Walk)

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