TEAM FCP EURO

Episode eight takes place at Road America, just outside of Elkhart Lake in Wisconsin. Like Watkins Glen in New York, it's a track that has taken several forms over the years–originally starting as a road course winding through the town itself. For a variety of reasons, the racing was moved to an actual facility, which is Road America as we know it today–a full 4.048 miles comprised of 14 turns, massive elevation changes throughout, and beautiful scenery surrounding it all. The team had known about Road America, played it on simulators, played it on video games, and pretty much anything else you could think of to get a sense of what it would be like before going, but none of it could prepare us for what it actually was. Road America exceeded our expectations in pretty much every way possible.

One of the best parts of Road America is how varying the weather can be. One day might be sunny skies and hot, the next could be cold, windy, and rainy. That's pretty much exactly what happened to us during the races. In two years of professional motorsports, we've never once had to race, qualify, or practice in the rain for any reason (crazy, right?). Road America broke that streak.

Not only did the races at Road America mark the first time we've put rain tires on the TCRs in a competitive environment, it held a much more meaningful and significant achievement for the team–clinching the team championship for the 2019 season. One of the core values at FCP Euro is "Achieve Results and Celebrate," and for a young racing program like ours, sometimes it's hard to do humbly.