Matt McMurry's column: Taking stock of a wild year

It's been a wild year with 24 races and one more to go at Estoril next weekend. Five of the 24 races came since my last post. One was in the European Le Mans Series. And two each were in the Lamborghini Blancpain Super Trofeo and Cooper Tires IMSA Lites Championship, during a Petit Le Mans Series that had really good memories. Here are the highlights:

Clean Sweep. I've had the pole snatched away from me on the last lap of qualifying a couple times this season in Lites. During round 13, it was my turn to grab the closing seconds heroics! Here's the pole lap video. Better yet, come race time I led every lap, got the fastest lap and won going away. JDC Motorsports had me hooked up. What a great feeling!

First GT Podium. In the last event of the weekend before the Petit Le Mans big show, Dylan Murcott and I teamed up with Mitchum Motorsports to finish 3rd in the amateur class and 7th overall in the Super Trofeo. I was pretty pumped about getting my second podium of the weekend, and especially considering I first drove a GT car about a month ago at VIR.

Are you Serious!? The second race of the Lites races was wet. I started fifth and was running in that position when I got nailed from behind and punted into the kitty litter. Nothing is more frustrating than being taken out by others! I get incidental contact, but this was not that. It was the fifth time in the Lites season that poor decisions by others took me out of a top-five finish. I wish the officials would take contact more seriously. Back in the Skip Barber days, contact resulted in an automatic stop-and-go, which really motivated clean driving throughout the field.

Surprise Visitor. I made a mistake at Paul Ricard during the ELMS race that took us out too early. I was pretty down in the dumps. I had high hopes for the race, since it was the first time revisiting a European track. Knock, knock. Who's there? McNish, yes, that McNish! Allan popped into the Greaves Motorsports trailer with his son Finley to give me a totally unexpected pep talk. How cool! He said it happens to everyone. And then he got me laughing when he said that what he's enjoying most about not driving anymore is not working out every day!

Petit Petit. For years my dad has been telling me about a crazy indoor kart race that happens the Tuesday of Petit Le Mans, thanks to Motorsports Ministries and the late Richard Anderson. Well, my dad and I finally got to race in it together, along with my coach Gerardo Bonilla! It's all for charity, so teams can "buy" their way to the top ... well, sort of like real racing! In this case though, they can acquire your car or bribe the officials with donations. We were in second one minute, then someone took our kart, then we got a -10 lap penalty! All in good fun.

-Matt

Matt McMurry Narrated Pole Lap Road Atlanta

Matt takes you for a pole position flyer around the 2.55-mile, hilly and super fast Road Atlanta in just 79 seconds in an IMSA Lites Elan DP-02.