4 car diary - The cheese becomes more binding

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Hour 23
By Bill King

As Elliott Forbes-Robinson was completing his first stint in The Boss Snowplow No. 4 Howard-Boss Motorsports Pontiac Crawford, the crystal clear outcome of Rolex 24 at Daytona clouded over. The contending No. 20 Howard- Boss Pontiac Crawford blew the transmission cooler, which took 20min to fix - long enough for the No. 77 Lexus Doran and the No. 4 to move up to second and third.

Then the No. 77 lost a cylinder and began to overheat, reducing its pace to the 1:57-2:00 range.

EFR pitted on leader Lap 649 and turned the car over to Jimmie Johnson to finish the race. The stop was a quick 47.614sec effort, and Johnson started cracking off 1:50s, rapidly reeling in the stuttering 77 car.

Just before the restart, Johnson dove the No. 4 in for a splash that will hopefully get Johnson to the checkered flag. On the restart at 11:15 a.m. EST, Johnson switched to Map 2 to conserve fuel. The extra stop put the 77 car back into second place some 20sec ahead of the 4 car; but Kevin Doran's efforts to cure the 77's electrical ills were not entirely successful and on leader Lap 683 - 49min from the finish - Johnson took second, a dozen laps behind the race leading No. 10 Pontiac Riley.

As the field settled in, Johnson led the 20 car by 12sec - both team cars running similar times and pulling away from the 77.

The end game is on.

Editor's note:
Please view all the diary entries by Bill King on the No. 4 Howard-Boss Motorsports Pontiac Crawford at http://www.motorsport.com/news/series.asp?S=GRANDAM