25 Hours of Thunderhill - BimmerWorld's view

The choice to race at December’s annual 25 Hours of Thunderhill event in northern California isn’t made without great consideration and planning. Racing non-stop through the Saturday-Sunday endurance contest in frigid conditions is enough of a deterrent to keep most teams away, and with an average of 70 cars jockeying for position on the 3.0-mile road course, the risk of damage and destruction filters out all but the most committed entries.
That left teams like BimmerWorld to head cross-country from their base in Virginia to use the ’25 Hour’ as the most severe proving grounds they could find to test the limits of their ‘Production V8,’ a BMW M3-based showcase for the company’s line of aftermarket performance components. And with a number of high-dollar factory racecars present, this event gave BimmerWorld the opportunity to demonstrate how much speed and consistency can be extracted from an unlimited approach to the popular BMW model.
With the exception of one prolonged call to the pits, BimmerWorld’s Production V8 performed flawlessly, recording a fifth-place finish in its class and 12th overall with team owner James Clay, BimmerWorld GRAND-AM drivers Gregory Liefooghe, Dan Rogers, and Seth Thomas, and BimmerWorld Club Racing veteran Harold Petit in charge of piloting the bad-fast BMW.
“I have driven this event twice before and always said I would return with a car we built one day to give it a solid run for the win,” said Clay as he reflected on the outcome of the race.  “The 25 Hour is a brutal race and very challenging, and I was really proud to be there with our BimmerWorld team who made it all run like a routine race day.  The Production V8 car is a big machine and that is what we needed to vie for the overall win.  Even though we didn't wrap it up this year, I think the result was good for our first run at it and I think we will come loaded for bear next year.”
From his perspective as a 25 Hour rookie, Petit was awestruck by what he found with the event and BimmerWorld’s efforts.
“I’m glad I made the trip!” he said. “I want to thank the BimmerWorld team and all our sponsors, especially Red Line Oil. I was a truly impressed by the level of preparation needed, and the dedication of the team members to get through the race was also inspiring. The pits were absolutely full with people and excitement starting Thursday and Friday on the test days all the way thru noon on Sunday when the race finished. I am so excited about coming back next year, and truly hope to make this an annual event for me.”
The amount of preparation required to race for a single weekend at the 25 Hour rivals what’s involved in getting a multi-car team ready for an entire season of GRAND-AM’s Continental Tire Series, and as Clay explains, key technical partners and sponsors play an instrumental role in getting BimmerWorld to the track and staying in the hunt for 25 hours.
“We couldn't have run this race with a program at this level without help from our sponsors,” Clay said.  “Red Line Oil has been tremendous through this whole Production V8 build process.  We worked together to come up with the idea of the car, and I think it is the type of extreme machine that showcases the Red Line product in a very demanding environment.  Hoosier Tire put us on slicks that held up to over two hour stints with excellent grip all the way through.  They even managed to get us some extra sets delivered at the track in less than 24 hours when it looked like we might run short.
“We have been working with Optima Batteries testing a new Lithium product that is super light-weight and impressive and they hand-delivered a special charger we needed.  Motion Control Suspension delivered a last-minute set of 3-Way dampers for spares, which sat happily unused in the trailer. It just seemed like all the companies we are so fortunate to work with really dug in to help and make this event possible.”
Red Line Synthetic Oil VP and COO Cameron Evans was also impressed with what BimmerWorld’s Production V8 achieved last weekend in Thunderhill, and saw the direct influence his company’s products played in making it to the finish line.
"The industry really turns out for Thunderhill and we were very happy with the car's reception,” he said. “Everyone loves that car! From the sounds to the attitude through the corners, the reaction from experts in the automotive business was great to hear. It's a massive undertaking to finish races at this level and the team's success proved what we already knew: Red Line has the right BMW products and BimmerWorld is the right team to show it."
Clay’s team of BMW experts will spend more time analyzing the custom M3 V8 components that came off the car last weekend, with the findings destined to be incorporated into the next wave of BimmerWorld offerings.
“This car has been an ongoing project since 2008, but it has really begun to be a lot of fun this year as the Production V8 project started to take form,” explains Clay. “We have been able to take years of development on this chassis, get rid of all the race rule restrictions, and build the pieces and products we want to run and sell to customers.  The build is a progression, and we actually built a lot of street performance parts along the way as well.  We will be releasing more information on this car and build in the coming months, and the products derived from it will be popping up on our website at a fairly rapid pace.”
The biggest question left for Clay after the 25 Hour is what he has planned for the Production V8’s next outing.
“The whole goal of the Production V8 car is to highlight our products and those of our partners like Red Line Oil in unique and demanding settings,” he stated.  “We are just closing the books on 2012 and while I think we all have some interesting ideas of what is next, we will probably put a little more work into it before it is finalized.  The short answer is that the car will continue to develop, we are still expecting big gains, and the results will be showcased in some interesting and impressive ways.  Tune in - it will be a fun trip!”
Follow the Production V8’s development and progress at www.bimmerworld.com/projects.php