At about 8:10pm with 50min remaining David radioed that he was coming in next lap. Everyone started setting up for what would be our 4th pitstop and 4th driverchange. I would be going in; along with the final 10 gallons of fuel for the last 45min. Once again, the pitstop was extremely flawless and everyone was moving even quicker. Being my 2nd stint of the race, I was quickly buckled in and waiting on fuel. Davids only advice to me was: "look for those reflective apex cones; they are your only hope!".
After the all-clear, I headed out of the pits with about a 2-lap lead over 2nd place in class. With the car all warmed up obviously everything was sticking well and I headed past the first set of turns away from the lighted pitlane into turns 2/3. What did I find - DARKNESS! And lots of it for the next 3 miles basically. Wow, words can't really explain it as there was just no light out there besides our OEM headlights that focus straight forward. Looking L and R for the reflective apex cones (the ones that remained that is) was difficult at the least and you really had to trust your knowledge of the track and assume everything was all clear. The corner workers had a tiny light to let you know it was manned; and we were told a larger flashing light to indicate a yellow.
After about 2 laps I realized that car was very 'hooked up'; better than before as the track wasn't as hot since the sun went down. It felt really good, but the fact I opted to go without the coolsuit was not a good call as the Mustang did not have much natural airflow in the car. I had one of the overall leaders - an older Daytona Prototype - come up on me down the lighted pitstraight so it was an easy pass to let happen. I then tried to stick with him to get the aid of his better lights but watching the taillights did indeed lead me into an offline approach and danger really quick, just as my friend had noted. A few laps later I caught up to a Miata and set him up for a pass down the lit straight too. Then I had to deal with about 1/2 a lap of mirrors with insanely bright lights and I just tried to hit my marks and put some distance on him. Other than that, there was NO traffic out on the 3.56 mile course that I had to deal with. Even though it was dark, I was running about the same laptimes (2:53-2:54's) as I did in the daylight. The car felt good, and I felt more comfortable with the car and the North course portion which I had not ran since 2008.
After the traffic; trying to settle into a more relaxed groove, I instantly ran wide in T2. Wow that was quick and dark! I tried the same groove approach I use for longer Endurance races on the next lap and the same exact thing happened - I missed my turn-in badly and nearly ran wide! Being my 2nd stint, dark, having driven 3+ hrs to the track, no other traffic to work with; whatever... it was difficult to concentrate in the pitch dark. So I instead decided to start turning hotlaps. With my mind focused on improving every laptime I started stomping out 2:50-2:51 laptimes. After about 10 of these I started really looking for the white flag - and was beginning to think about the fuel situation. Having not been passed by any in-class car I was assuming we had the win but still focused on getting the car back safely and enjoying it!
After a 2:50.3 I got a hesitation on very next lap on the front straight! I know knew I could now complete 1.5 laps after the initial hesitation (David did earlier) so I decided to conserve some fuel circle with short shifts and hope for the white flag. And I got it; with a slower 2:55 laptime! I had no idea if I could make another lap but I was committed. I just hoped I would not run out of gas and get rear-ended somewhere! I coasted as much as I could and don't think I ever touched the brake pedal the last lap. Once to the N course (the last 1/3 of the lap) it was struggling to pick up throttle at all. Once I got to the final turn before pit-in it was barely sputtering and I was down to 20-30mph of momentum. I coasted into pit lane where the lights started and I knew I would be ok, the car then died completely as I rolled into a pit stall only 6 short of ours! I flashed my lights, shut off the car and waited for the team to reach me. We exchanged a few quick high-fives and they pushed me back into the pits.
Packed with adrenaline the team stood around and talked for nearly an hour after the awards. Everyone was shocked at the laptimes I was putting down in the dark. Maybe I found a calling? Since everyone else seems to hate the extra challenges of night racing! I downed a gatorade and headed home. Pulling into the garage around 1am - my day consisted of 6.5 hrs in the 335i to/from the track and two 50 minutes stints in the racecar for a total of 8+ hrs driving! Thanks to everyone for their help.
New firsts: 1st place in an Endurance Race (after piling up 2 seconds), my 1st time ever racing in the dark, my 1st time ever with 2+ stints in the same day!
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