Going to the Rolex 24 Hours @ Daytona
February 2-6, 2000

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I LOVE C5 Registry events! The thing I like best about being a Registry member is the comraderie of the members; meeting, talking, eating, drinking... well, you get the idea!

Wednesday, February 2nd

This one started for us with our (now) traditional get-together of the Atlanta Area C5ers at the Rio Bravo Restaurant in Dunwoody, GA. We find that we gather at the drop of a hat -- in this case, to kick off the trip to Daytona, FL and this year's running of the Rolex 24 Hour endurance race.

Here's our usual million-dollars-worth of C5s:

Left to right: This is is my daughter, Kristyn (she stands to inherit all my Corvettes so it's time she came to one of these events), Don Danysh (C5R#X1881) and my bride Gael (now fully recovered from her run-in (run-down?) with my C5 in the parking lot of the Opryland Hotel -- but that's another story...)

Here are the hands of Pete Butler (C5R#W1005), Larry and Amy Stoneburner (C5R#X2203), Richard Scruggs (C5R#X2066) and Ken Gaines (C5R#X1982) (among the twenty-five of us at dinner; the darned strobe just didn't have the oomph to get down the long table)!

Thursday, February 3, 2000

The plan was to caravan from Atlanta to Savannah, GA (actually Tybee Island, GA) for a low-country boil dinner hosted by Tony and Nancy Petrea (C5R#W1413); we would gather at my house at 11am with the plan to hit the road at noon.

We had nine cars in our caravan:

Bob Adams & LuAnne X3351 Cincinnati, OH 99MagRedRoadster
Tom Capinski X1746 Alpharetta, GA 99PewterRoadster
Russ Cartmill W0115 Eatonton, GA 98WhiteTarga
Chaz Cone & Joe Blumberg W0526 Atlanta, GA 98BlackTarga
Don Danysh X1881 Dunwoody, GA 97SilverTarga
Ed Duprey W0276 Livonia, MI 98WhiteTarga
Jeff Erisman and son, Josh W1479 Lawrenceville, GA 99MagRedTarga
Ron & Robin Floyd X2186 Woodstock, GA 99MagRedTarga
Richard Scruggs & nephew Chase X2066 Monroe, GA 2000YellowTarga

Ed Duprey droved in on Wednesday afternoon (long haul from Michigan) and spent the night with us. Bob and LuAnne drove all night and arrived at the house at about 10:00am Thursday morning. They crashed for an hour or so. And they left their car in the driveway in such a way that neither Ed nor I could get our cars out!

All Ed could do was detail his car; waste no time!

This is most of us gathered in the driveway just about ready to hit the road. From left: LuAnne, Bob Adams, Ron Floyd, Jeff Erisman, Josh Erisman, Don Danysh, Tom Capinski, Ed Dupree and Richard Scruggs. And, in the upper right corner you can just make out Joe and Cathleen Blumberg exiting their Audio A6.

We left right on time. Our first stop was at an outlet mall on I-75 South. Don had to exchange a pair of pants (don't ask).

Bob and LuAnne
Robin and Ron Floyd
Chase and Richard Scruggs
Jeff and Josh Erisman
Tom, Ed and Russ

Here's Ed Duprey going for gas (yes, the only one who didn't fill up before leaving Atlanta...). He's so fast he's almost a blur....as he races a parked Rustang for position...

Great shot taken by Joe through the windshield of seven of the nine of us. I (as usual) brought up the rear of the caravan; Ed Duprey was our leader). On this leg of the trip we had a pretty thrilling 140 MPH mile or so run. WOW!!!

We made it safely to Tony and Nancy Petrea's house in Savannah at 5pm where there were even more C5s gathered:

The Virginia (and North) caravan arrived at about the same time as we did. Kent Cartner, John Jones, Lynn & Curt Kennedy, Russell Schmidt, Dean and Dorothy Smith, Wayne Goonan, Norm Crowe (in a Saab; don't ask) and more. And some more Georgia folks: Merrell Floyd, Jim and Alice Trusley.

The only casualty of the trip was a bad set of marks left on the hood of Bob Adams' C5 by a "Road 'Gator". But with WD-40 to the rescue, it cleaned right off!

Here's our host, Tony Petrea talking with Don Danysh as Tony's son Mason (and their Pomeranian (Buffy) look on)

In additon to a pair of Torch C5s (a 97 and a 99) Tony also owns a fully restored 56; I wish you could see the paint job on this car; it's magnificent! (that vertical mark on the fender is a reflection).

That night (Thursday) eighty of us (Tony and Nancy's local club joined us) had a low-country boil of slaw, corn, sausage, shrimp and beer. I was too busy pigging out to take a single picture! Kent Cartner and I both received plaques; Kent's for making it to Savannah without losing a wheel (yet) and me for getting to Savannah with knocking down a single pedestrian (yet). Riiiight

Friday, February 4, 2000

When Tony Petrea organizes a caravan, he ORGANIZES a caravan. Here's Tony with a Thunderbolt GA Police friend -- who provided a "blue-light escort" for us all from Tybee to I-95!

At a potty break at the Waffle House, here's friend Joe reading up on his new video camera; need to master it before the Parade Lap at Daytona!

...and so we bade a fond farewell to our friendly police officer,

and quickly reached Jacksonville, FL, Exit 100 on I-95 where we met up with mo' C5ers:

Barry (da Bear) and Dottie Landry
June & Joe Rankin
Caryll & Allen Cothern
Jim and Alice Trusley
Tony and Nancy Petrea
Kurt and Lynn Kennedy
John Jones and Kent Cartner
My co-pilot, Joe Blumberg
Since we were stopped anyhow......MEAL EVENT!

(That's Tom Beaird looking like a deer in the headlights)

Now our seventeen-car caravan headed on down to Daytona Beach. Got to the track about 2:30 and hit the Corvette Corral in the infield right away.

And then we saw this one. Think it's a Rolex Pace Car? Think again....

Nope! It's Walker Bower's Millennium Yellow Targa -- painted to match this year's Rolex Pace Car! 'Way to go, Walker!

The C5 Registry hospitality party stared at 6:30p at the Indigo Country Club; the first folks we saw were the C5 Registry Office staff; here are Marisa and Kathy:

Here's Dan introducing Andy Pilgrim and the other drivers of the #4 C5R race car.

We had a combo and everything...

Old-timer C5ers will recognize who I'm talking to. That's Dan Douglas C5R#V0003 -- the very first member of the Registry!

Here's Dan announcing the new C5 Registry Racing program, the Speedvision Corvette Series "Corvette - The American Dream" and the Offical C5 Registry BBS!

Here's Dave Hill, Corvette Chief Engineer spilling the beans on the close-in plans for the C5 and C6 Corvette (riiiiight....)

Saturday, February 5, 2000

Dan and Jake had again arranged a Parade Lap for Registry members. The gate opened to the staging area at 7am but a hundred of us were there early (just to be sure we got in)! By the time the Parade Lap started at noon, there were 280 Corvettes there -- the largest gathering of C5 Corvettes ever assembled in one place (except in the Bowling Green plant itself)!

So there IS a race going on. Here are some pix of the #3 C5R coming out of a turn:

As you all must know by now, the #3 C5R finished in second place; and not just second place in the GTO class, but second place OVERALL -- ahead of all the surviving Sports Racer class cars! AWESOME PERFORMANCE!