It was the day before race day, and all the qualifying sessions have been completed. From the hotel, Pikes Peak looked covered in clouds. In the hotel parking lot, the Big Red crew performed a full nut-and-bolt tightening session, cleaned the oil breather system, and more. Others took to the mountain for a scouting report of weather conditions for when Big Red would be starting the next day. If the days play out the same, any time after 1:00 p.m. would be questionable for making a fast, clean run to the Summit because of weather conditions. It was quite common to see the cute yellow-bellied marmot on Pikes Peak. Fully grown, they can be 27 inches and weigh over 11 pounds. Bighorn sheep were walking around Devil’s Playground. On race day, a sheep stood in the middle of the road on a corner and walked off just before Big Red raced through. Just a little reminder that racing is inherently dangerous. You can control the car and the road, but you can’t control nature (in respect
to the weather and animals). The starting line barely can be seen from the “Ws” 3,000-feet below. It was about noon, and the clouds were just starting to roll in. The official PPIHC app was already sending news bulletins in preparation of the race.ll the crew needed to do was load Big Red in the trailer and have Paul drive to the pits and position the trailer for race-day morning. The car and supplies were delivered on Saturday at 2:00 p.m., so the morning of race day there aren’t 50 trailers trying to park at 2:00 a.m. Dave is cleaning up Pikes Peak. Actually he’s clearing a path in the woods to park the support vehicles off the roadway beside the pit area. The team went back to the hotel for an early dinner and some sleep in preparation for that 1:00 a.m. wake-up call.
