| ‘I Thought It Was Going to Be Heartbreaking,’ Says Bourdais;‘He Did a Great Job,’ Commends Tincknell March 10, 2022By Jeff OlsonIMSA Wire Service  DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – The lead was his, the car stout and comfortable, with victory seemingly moments away for Sebastien Bourdais. As he cruised along with a healthy lead, though, the comfort departed with urgency. The car’s footing was suddenly gone, and with it, Bourdais’ comfort. The car wanted to be anywhere but on the track. Its rear wing had collapsed. With a snap, victory went from likely to improbable. “I was like, ‘What happened here?’” Bourdais said. “I’m all sorts of sideways. The car has just gone away from me, and it really feels like it’s over.” As he got to Turn 17 at Sebring International Raceway, Bourdais slid wide. Harry Tincknell, trying hard to gain ground, watched in disbelief as he chased Bourdais. “To be completely honest, I thought he just made a mistake,” Tincknell said. “He was driving a bit more cautiously after that, but he was absolutely rapid on the straights. That gave him a good defense. I’d come out of (Turn) 16 right on his gearbox, but he’d always pull away. I couldn’t get past him. It was slightly annoying in the car.” This is a story that will be retold for years to come. Somehow, Bourdais gathered his wits and a broken car and kept it going long enough to win the 2021 Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring Presented by Advance Auto Parts. Now, a year later, Bourdais speaks to the significance and drama of the victory and where it ranks among his 47 professional wins spanning IMSA, IndyCar, IROC and Australian Supercars. The confidence that quickly turned to uncertainty, the calm that became chaos and the meaning of the race for himself, JDC-Miller MotorSports and teammates Loic Duval and Tristan Vautier. “It really rates right up there,” Bourdais said. “We had to overcome quite a bit with a small organization that executed all the way. It looked like they were out of luck and all of a sudden we’re winning the Twelve Hours of Sebring. It’s definitely right up there. For me, I’d say it’s in my top five.” Here’s how it played out in those final chaotic minutes: 19:20 left. The final restart.At the final restart, Bourdais was upbeat. Trouble had found the No. 01 Chip Ganassi Racing Cadillac and the No. 5 Mustang Sampling/JDC-Miller Cadillac DPi V.R had the lead with a clear track ahead. “We cycled to the lead and I was like, ‘It looks like we’ve got this,’” Bourdais said. “At that point, the race is winding down and it’s all looking pretty good, but I’ve been there before. That race can slip away from you faster than you can blink. I was in that mode where I couldn’t believe where we were and where we are now. The car was pretty good and quick enough to win the thing outright.” That, of course, is typically when trouble pays a visit. As Bourdais approached Turn 17 with a collapsed rear wing, he slid out of the line and into the slag, narrowly avoiding the wall. “I didn’t know how close he came to hitting the wall,” said Tincknell, who was giving chase in the No. 55 Mazda Motorsports Mazda DPi. “All I know was he was really, really wide. He came back on just in front of me. From then on, he had no pace at all.” 13:20 left. Broken wing, fresh challenge.When the wing on Bourdais’ car went askew, he thought the problem involved the front bar. He adjusted it and the brake bias, which helped, but the car continued to act out. What had been a comfortable, confident drive from the lead for Bourdais quickly turned into a rodeo. The harder he tried to control the horse, the more it wanted to throw him. “It’s very rare that you get a partial wing failure,” Bourdais said. “It either collapses and it’s gone or it’s not. The whole assembly had slid down. The car was barely drivable enough to keep it on the track. At that point, you’re not even trying to understand what’s making it happen. I knew fairly quickly that it wasn’t the front bar, but I didn’t even bother trying to understand it. I’d run out of tools to make it good, so I was just trying to make it as drivable as possible.” The flattened wing did offer something positive: more straightaway speed. Each time Bourdais and Tincknell exited Turn 16, Bourdais shot ahead, the beneficiary of less downforce. “I’d be right on him and I’d think, ‘Right, I’m going to lunge him going into (Turn) 17,'” Tincknell said. “And then he’d always just pull away where I just couldn’t get past him. It was cat and mouse like that for the end of the race. We caught traffic sometimes and I’d have a chance, but it was super high-risk. It wasn’t going to work out.” 2:30 left: The challenge heats up.“In my head, I was like, ‘There’s no way I’m going to manage to keep those guys behind and not crash,’” Bourdais said. “You’re trying to drive as quick as you can but at the same time, you’re in survival mode. It was a big mind game.” Meanwhile, his pursuer had problems of his own. Tincknell’s radio had malfunctioned. Not only was he cut off from communicating with the team, he didn’t know how much time was left in the race. “There was no way to fix it,” Tincknell said. “I was driving fully blind in the dark, no pun intended. I knew as soon as I went out that this was what those long team briefings and protocols were for in this situation. I just had to delve into those.” Two minutes left. It’s about to get hot in here.Before the wing collapsed, Bourdais, Duval and Vautier had worked hard to get the No. 5 car in position to gain the lead. Two laps behind at one point, they patiently worked back onto the lead lap. The final driver change put Bourdais – the team’s parttime endurance driver last year – in the seat for the finish. “The guys were like, ‘Hey, we want you to finish,’” Bourdais said. “I was like, ‘You know it’s not my car, right? I’m not doing a full season anymore.’ But they were all pretty adamant that they wanted me to finish. I was like, ‘OK, all right.’ I could see that we had pace but that it was a longshot.” Then the wing broke, and Bourdais had other thoughts. “This is exactly why you don’t want to be doing this when it’s not your championship or your car,” he said. “You’re finally leading the race and on live TV you’re going to end up looking like an idiot when you stuff that car somewhere and lose the race for everybody. Nobody is going to know or care that you had a problem. When you don’t win, nobody comes to talk to you. In the back of my mind, I was like, ‘Man, this is messed up.’” Last lap. Battle to the line.As Kamui Kobayashi in the No. 48 Ally Cadillac tried in vain to get around Tincknell for second place, Bourdais pulled away to win by 1.435 seconds. Born of broken parts and determination, the race was an instant classic. “He did a great job,” Tincknell said of Bourdais. “I haven’t watched it back, so I don’t know how close he was to crashing in Turn 17. It seemed so close. I just remember seeing the car and thinking that it was such an unusual place for a car to be. It must have been fairly close. To not make any mistakes and adapt so quickly was very impressive.” Thrilled with the win, Bourdais had an underlying feeling. Relief. “I was glad when it was over,” Bourdais said. “I lost a few days of life expectancy on that one. … For 15 minutes, I thought it was going to be heartbreaking. I kept thinking, ‘Man, I’m going to run out of talent here. I’m going to make a mistake, and it’s not going to be pretty.’ Relieved was really the word when I first crossed the finish line.” |
