Team JPM Dragon-i celebrate podium on MME-R 2010
To spectators, motorsports is about mostly lap times and who won. To those in the game, it is an adventure. Behind every team, successful or otherwise, is a story. Many a time, these stories are not told, and they remain as inside jokes amongst the fraternity.
Yesterday, we caught up with the folks from Team JPM Dragon-i, who told us the tales behind their 2nd placed finish in the Sports Production Class for the recently concluded 12-hour Merdeka Millenium Endurance Race 2010 (MME-R 2010) held at the Sepang International Circuit.
Our local motorsports scene is somewhat hindered by a combination of scarce funds and increasingly high costs, a situation that resulted in low participation from local teams in MME-R 2010. In fact, Team JPM Dragon-i’s participation was not confirmed until two weeks before the race.
The team’s Porsche 996, in use since 2007, was re-sprayed with a new paint job & livery for 2010, featuring purple racing stripes running along a pastel yellow body. Taking turns to pilot the car over the 12 hour race were T.J. Chin, T.P. Chin, and Jeffrey Wong, whose combined effort saw them clock 271 laps, three more than the previous team record of 268 which saw them to the podium in 2003.
It was not all smooth sailing on the track though. The Porsche was faced with problems with its brakes and electronics, in addition to an exhaust leak that robbed the engine of significant power. According to team manager J.P. Chin, the only spare parts available to the team at the time were brake pads, and they had to really improvise on a great many things just to get the car going.
JP Motorsports has been a regular participant of MME, having raced in every edition of the race since its inception in 2000. 2010 nearly marked the team’s first omission from the MME line-up until Chinese restaurant chain Dragon-i stepped in just in time to provide funding.
The spectacle of this year’s MME was somewhat tarred by images of a burnt Lotus 2-Eleven that caught fire during refueling. Commenting on the incident, Mr J.P. Chin expects a tightening of safety regulations in future editions of the MME or even events in Sepang as a whole. He also noted that impact of the disaster could have been minimized had other members of the team crew were standing further away from the car at the time of refueling.
Team JPM Dragon-i prides itself for being a fully Malaysian outfit from management, to driver, to crew, and even sponsors. It hopes to pave the way for more sponsorship to enter the local motorsports scene and ultimate raise the level of motorsports in the country.
