Johann Sebastian Bach, the Master

Music has always been a very important subject in my life and although choice is of a virtual infinity, J S Bach is the source of the deepest music connection and feelings.

It amazes me that seven notes of music can create such diversity and allow for any musical talent to compose new tunes, new melodies, new themes, concertos, fugues, symphonies and rarely find a similitude between two compositions.

Seven notes with five variables and the mind of a composer can bring joy or tears, energy or meditation. Potentially twelve notes, with different intervals, scales, values and keys have been charming our ears for hundreds of years.

Early music had such a wide range of structures and of different modes. In our contemporary era, Schoenberg created the dodecaphony, a constant twelve note structure appropriate to the last evolution of classical music, avoiding the use of keys. Still only twelve notes…

The compositions as we hear daily and based on the known and defined keys, gave from the early Baroque composers a structure in which infinitely variable, yet recognizable sounds could be appreciated with the full range of feelings. From religious to secular, from formal to wild, orchestral to song, classical to jazz, we are still discovering daily new deviations as music continue to charm us with countless distinctions.

Of the tens of thousands of composers that have written music, J S Bach is the favorite to many people. Countless interpretations have been played, slower, faster, creating different tempo, rediscovering early versions, transposed for different instruments or using new electronic voices, these are rediscoveries of the same JS Bach compositions, breathing, animated and flowing to our senses the extraordinary beauty of the music of a higher power.

From Glenn Gould, Isaac Stern, Neville Marriner, Angela Hewitt, Vladimir Horowitz, Jean Louis Steuerman, Yehudi Menuhin to Jacques Loussier, Swingle Singers, Walter and Wendy Carlos and many, many, many more who expressed their personal understandings of JS Bach compositions, I believe he would enjoy them all, smiling at the suspicion of a secret code justifying his timeless, structured and spatial compositions.

I believe any beautiful creation can be mentally projected in a box, even butterflies, although I do not believe we can justify, rationalize and codify the immense beauty of the mind’s creation, as it is the product of the mystery of our universal power and collective intelligence that some of us were giving a better access in specific aspects, although with life counterpoints.

Peter Wollny, a music critic wrote: “The carefully worked-out counterpoint of a piece serves, according to Birnbaum (Johann Abraham Birnbaum, a contemporary of Bach, was a professor of rhetoric in Leipzig who wrote a famous apologia on J S Bach’s technique of composition), to correct the imperfections of nature; consequently the complexity of the elaborate intertwining presented in a work determines the measure of its beauty. This concept of musical perfection is probably best documented as far as Bach’s orchestral music is concerned in the concertos for several keyboard instruments. The unprecedented contrapuntal richness of these works is hardly comprehensible in all its dimensions, even after one has heard them frequently; however, the innumerable contrapuntal ramifications and details which constitute the individual movements, fuse into an overall impression which is definitely comprehensible – and this is exactly what shows Bach’s greatness, in that he does not build esoteric castles in the air, but creates expressive and committed master works.”

Johann Sebastian Bach is certainly at the helm of the specially talented human beings who gave us an enduring deep sense of beauty made of seven notes and variations.

Thank you master!

To all the Friends who signed up and read this Blog

I thank you for your signs of interests, it humbles me and it helps me to go back at it and in consequence I have a few posts I will publish soon.

I realize the Guest Book is a good idea; nevertheless, I cannot contact anyone. If you wish to leave a trace, please comment after a post, you opinion will be welcome.

Thank you again for your interests.

Be humans, not Sheep

The negative political statement phenomenon is one of the most destructive practice, as one can form an offensive, intentional and calculated argument before hearing someone else’s viewpoint. This is now a new branch of marketing as a science, making us eating, drinking, buying and accepting whatever one had planned for us to do.

Democracy is based on hearing everyone’s viewpoint to form consensuses to be represented, not political parties inducing people with marketing plots to make us think their way for ulterior motives.

We have now reach a such level of systematic reactive fights against the others, including against the Government, that it could ultimately be viewed by outside observers as criminal acts against the functioning of a Nation.

Among industrialized Countries, The USA is the last bastion of careless apathy for their own citizens, incapable of supporting the disfranchised, except anecdotally at Thanksgiving, as if poor people were eating once a year. It is as we have looked in our own mirror for so long that we forgot the World has drastically changed around us and our old arguments are now either funny or depressing stand-up comedy subjects around the World.

We, as a Nation, were not capable of rebuilding a City destroyed by a hurricane and we keep forgetting about it as if it did happen on another Planet. Yes, it is going to cost money to fix 40 years of social political standing still, and it is going to cost even more to fix all the thousands crumbling bridges and hundreds of dams ready to drawn villages and towns, collapsing sewage and water pipes all around the Nation, overloaded dated National electrical grid, outdated power plants and roads looking like minefields.

We disregarded maintaining and rebuilding the infrastructure of the Nation by fear of the money spending finger pointing game. We had one warning of a collapsing bridge not too long ago and we already forgot, distracted by the next offensive argument we bought for the sake of satisfying our emerging national anger fomented by our divisive political parties.

It is going to cost as water flows the river to eradicate the more than 20% of illiterate Americans, a statistic we have been maintaining for the past 30 years, and in good part responsible for the seven and half millions Citizens in jail, representing a shaming 25% of the entire World imprisoned population; although the USA only represent 4.6% of our planet inhabitants.

And it is going to cost so much to lower the count of the few Hundreds of Thousands of People dying each year of devastating and expanding illnesses from our greed of mass-producing dangerous food, drinks including processed water, confusing drugs helping and killing people at the same time, and allowing the air we breathe a few times a minute and everyday of our live to be corrosive.

What it is going to cost to finally take responsibility of the 66% of American people declared obese, making us ranked 42 of the world Countries on this subject? Have you seen the movie Wally? It was barely for kids, as we are getting closer to that world of Trash Mountains and obese boneless people.

We can go on this realistic statistical path for a while, showing how close we are to become the richest Third World Country. As if we, as a Nation, continue arguing instead of acting, we will soon loose any reason for national pride as we could end up being called something else.

Listen to your heart and re-develop your human senses, not political arguments, as they are made to lure you to fight against, whatever against they need for you to fight for their interests at a time. Be humans, not sheep. Freedom is not a one-block package we keep while being distracted day and night with TV, toys and games. It is a malleable form we have to accommodate for anyone around us and fight a peaceful and respectful fight to keep it alive and well, as freedom is a privilege we all have to share, not a right we wave out only when we feel threatened.

New Indy Car or the lack of direction

We hear spectators, armchair racers, team owners, drivers, mechanics, engineers, the press, and yes, let’s say anyone and everyone complaining about the look of the near vintage Indy car in use. The good news is IRL is - finally - going to change their spec car that has been running since 2003, although the bad news is that we will have to wait until 2012 before knowing if the series did found the magic formula to save the top category of Open Wheel racing in the US and in consequence, open wheel racing in this Country.

Amazing to remember that CART Indy car had 4 different engines, 5 chassis manufacturers, 16 teams and 34 drivers participating to the 1999 championship. Something was new every months and every years at that time. It was the best motor head soap opera in the US and threatening Formula 1 supremacy around the world.

The Dallara chassis still in use today was designed at a time oval track racing was an exclusivity in IRL, with 9 of the new emerging fast tracks of near 1 ½ mile long and 3 older super speedways, leaving space for only 4 higher downforce shorter tracks during the season.

Fast ovals, no street or road course track to compromise with and a head to head competition with another chassis builder, G-Force, led Dallara to design a very specialized chassis with a priority to be Indy 500 specific. Mind you, cars were designed as a three-year generation.

According to the rules, an IRL chassis had to be designed to potentially be used for “right and left turns” type tracks, which certainly was not a concern as it would have been easy to design new parts to create a clumsy but running car on any race track, as long as one could win the 500’s. Ultimate competitiveness on road course was not of any concern, not knowing when IRL would finally decide to expend into international type racing.

We know what happens. Road and Street Courses gradually took over half of the races and one chassis got name the only spec car of the series. The car that was designed to run at 230 mph and only leave a speed sensation to the spectators, was suddenly exposed to close scrutiny, awkwardly taking slow turns at 50 mph and showing its lack of stick in fast road course bends, creating a visual disaster in comparison with CART and Champ Cars electrifying cornering speeds and well proportioned shapes.

But let’s move forward leaving behind enough facts to write a thick book on what did happened, didn’t, and what we all have lost, including many jobs that no one seems to want talking about.

What is IRL thinking!

Here is a reminder of the attributes IRL has defined to select the new Indy car that will start competing in 2012:

Safe: The new chassis must adhere to the league's already high safety standards while exploring new technology to improve safety in all aspects of the car.

Raceable: The new chassis must continue to produce the exciting racing that has become signature of the IZOD IndyCar Series while not affecting other cars on track (i.e. less sensitive to the turbulence).

Cost-effective: The league continues to work to reduce the cost of participation for teams in the IZOD IndyCar Series, which remains an important priority in this economic climate. The new chassis must have a price point that adheres to that goal.

American-made: The new chassis must be built in the U.S., preferably at an Indiana-based facility.

Less mass/more efficient: A lighter chassis with less mass that produces the same aerodynamic effect in an efficient way.

Relevant technology: The league would like the new chassis to be relevant to the future of the consumer auto industry; innovative technology that is born on the racetrack and can translate to consumer cars.

Modern look: More space for sponsor logos, cars easily identifiable.

Green: The Indy Racing League prides itself on its role in the greening of racing and wants to maintain its position as a leader in environmentally-friendly initiatives with this chassis.

"Our chassis is the most complex challenge in world motorsports because of the variety of race courses where we compete," Barnhart said. "It must be designed to run at 235 mph at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and protect drivers and spectators in high-speed crashes. It must be able to run on superspeedways, speedways and short ovals as well as natural-terrain road courses and temporary circuits."

Barnhart said safety is the foremost requirement in design of the new chassis and the league has identified areas to improve through its own research and testing. A reduction of between 40 percent and 50 percent of the current chassis cost is sought - principally through the reduction in inventory necessary to transition between oval kits and road/street course kits (brakes, uprights, etc.).

Additionally, a lighter car reduces the power requirement and enhances fuel efficiency. For the fourth year in a row, the IZOD IndyCar Series will be the only motorsports property to utilize a renewable and environmentally friendly fuel (100 percent fuel-grade ethanol).

"Our drivers take the greatest risks in the world of sports driving IndyCars and it is paramount we have the best safety features designed into this next generation of cars," Barnhart said. "It is also important that we continue to develop more relevance between the new generation of IndyCars and the cars that world manufacturers will be producing in the future. Finally, we have stipulated that the new chassis must be made in the United States, preferably Indiana, to take advantage of more competitive pricing and the existing American supplier network for parts and protect our team from issues with currency fluctuations."

Not so fast!

This reads like a commercial with self-proclaimed product quality, isn’t it?

We have seen renderings, studio concepts, ideas beings put forward by race car manufacturers and even an offbeat advance concept, all of them radical in some aspects and respecting the confusing definition of the IRL recommendations. But let’s look at the guidelines again, point after point, to understand the meaning and its consequences on a designer’s mind.

Safe is in fact one of the two aspects of a race car design. How safe the cars need to be? According to its self proclaimed safety level, IRL mention to follow the high standard already defined by themselves, while “exploring new technologies to improve safety in all aspects of the car”, which support some contradictions in its terms and essentially leave to the car designers to define themselves safety, as it should be the function of the sanctioning body to fully define safety and the various tests necessary to measure and check the extend of the submissions. This should be true even if a back door should be open to allow for some suggestions.

Raceable is a side category of competitiveness, which is the second aspect of race car design. Again, IRL is padding themselves on their own back by writing “the chassis must continue to produce the exciting racing that has become signature of the IZOD IndyCar Series while not affecting other cars on track (i.e. less sensitive to the turbulence).”

This seems to be an advice to conceive a different car as the one “producing the exciting racing”, with better rear vortices definition to allow following cars to keep a better aerodynamic balance in quantity and distribution. It is in fact what sanctioning bodies have tried to achieve around the world and through various rules changes. It seems that IRL has not defined what it would take to achieve this important task and instead has handed the relay baton to designers.

Cost-effective was and still is an important factor now pushing IRL to react with various radical considerations. The omni-justifying economic downturn topic combined with a lack of appropriate ruling evolution is leading the IRL to look at drastic measures that might not solve the problems, as the problems themselves have not been defined in years past.

An American-made car is also part of the new cost-effective scheme.

A new theme is also added, contradicting their long time philosophy of heavier car of more material for more energy absorption is now becoming less mass/more efficient.

It is a logic but short thinking process to propose the cutting cost of cars and racing them without looking first at the commercial worth of the racing to be lifted to a value of return. Ultimately, it would not matter if cars and researches would be relatively expensive if exposures and commercial values were flourishing as it was 10 years ago. Now, looking at it from the other side of the lens, even if an Indy Car would cost the price of a Formula Ford, it would still become too expensive if no sponsor would show up to pay the bills.

Going back to drastic cost reduction, to what extends amortizing the installation of a complete race car manufacturing facility in Indiana and/or subleasing the services of existing facilities is going to reduce manufacturing prices in comparison with producing race cars in existing and already paid facilities and adding shipment cost, is debatable. I know, we talk about the rate of exchange between Europe and the US, as if it was a constant factor. In effect, a stabilized rate of exchange, which is about the case now, is normalizing costs with products becoming less expensive in Europe to end up loosing their advantage through exchange rate. In any case, the real final production cost would need to be justified before knowing a benefit has been made.

The lack of cost scrutiny might have been a bigger factor than some easier excuses. I believe a range of solutions covering the various aspects of cost would help more than reacting with drastic measures that, even to satisfy friends at local shops, might not control enough what became the black sheep of Open Wheel racing today.

High quality and rare materials in use to make Indy Cars are always going to be expensive and labor will remain a specialized more expensive labor to be paid. Research cost is not going away, if one wish for research to be part of this type of racing, past the pre-production study.

Nevertheless, if need be, a cost-plus system as practiced in the aerospace and defense industries would help control some of the expenditure problems, providing the cost part of the equation is well defined, as it is not always the case in defense programs.

An overreaction has never been the best solution to any problem and generally hides something, whether of past decisions, or lack of knowledge of the subject, or anything else one can imagine and suspect.

The relevant technology concern of innovation, born on the racetrack that can transfer to consumer cars, is an old dream of non-engineer mind, thinking that one can invent new features that would be effective on a race car and could be used in the automobile industry, all of that at the lowest cost racing can be.

I understand, it is a good idea but it shows so much the lack of technical and engineering mastery expressed by over-reacted and inexpert minds.

The technology, as expressed here is most of the time techniques, as well as the use of existing technologies and applied in different environments.

It is always possible that new thinking would lead car manufacturers to use these ideas in production. In this case, rules would have to open, allowing for the inventive mind to expend freer, which in return would increase cost. The Formula 1 teams were complaining about the cost of the KERS devise development, when they effectively spend 10 to 30 times more money than any top Indy Car teams.

What are we seeing so far?

All published projects have some caricatural looks reminiscent of Hot Wheels or Star War vehicles, while Formula 1 is following their rules and looking as advanced as it can be. Asking designers to define themselves a “modern look” is leading them to expend on style instead of fine tuning the consequences of well defined rules. A modern look could simply mean that a new car would have the look of having been designed in 2010 instead of in 2002. The Panoz DP01 Champ Car was a modern looking car when it was raced in 2007. Today, new collective ideas are in every designer’s minds and would create a de facto modern looking car without searching for some stylistic look, as these bright people are, in any case, not studio designers. It seems that every designer did fall into the search for a hypothetical look, maybe to satisfy some unclear emphasis on “modern look” and have a chance to be retained as a potential IRL chassis supplier.

Green is one of these terms eventually meaning nothing, or why not the consequence of mixing yellow and blue colors, or whatever we want to show as image in tune with consumption and renewable energy.

The danger of wanting to be so called green with no definition can reveal a lack of depth later. Using ethanol made of sugar cane is an apparent good thing, although when we count the energy consumption of production and transport by trucks, jumbo boats and trucks again, all burning vast quantity of oil, one can find that the green concept is rapidly fading. Worst is to be aware of the mega deforestation necessary to create farming land, itself burning vast quantity of oil and ultimately reducing the needed World conversion of CO2 by plants.

I know, paying attention to energy consumption is very important, although it has to be true savings. Mr. Rudolf Diesel had invented his engine in the late 1800’s and was looking at using available combustibles such as coal powder or various vegetable oils. His first engine was running on peanut oil. Today, we know that diesel engines can run on fast food recycled oil, raw rapeseed oil strait out of an extracting mill and who knows what researchers have found recently in converting algae and yard grass into carburant.

The development of hybrid cars and now heavy freight trucks could lead race car engine manufacturers to expend their researches into racing applications that would lead to more experiments and developments, and back to production after having been exposed to different and extreme conditions. And this might be where the transfer to production can happen; not in chassis and aerodynamic designs, as they are too specific and of a too drastically different environment than street cars.

If the series want to show "green" interests, it might be time to systematically recycle paper, cardboard boxes, bottles, cans and plastics of all kinds being thrown in trash containers, and sometime around them, during every race weekends and by the tons daily. Showing example to spectators and encouraging them to do the same would be "greener" than many other para-green ideas. 

All of that is really confusing!

Green? Yes but not just for the sake of carrying the name as a label with untrue gain.

It is odd that a very conservative series, or at least the thinking behind, having kept the same car for 9 years, increasing weight for safety reasons, is suddenly opening the door to outside thinking of safety and transferrable technologies when cost is the primary concern and leading to impose manufacturing to be 40 to 50% cheaper than the actual car cost. In a short sentence, more expenses yet far cheaper!

I would assume that IRL still intent for high quality carbon fiber, resin, curing processes, high strength steel, aluminum and advanced manufacturing techniques to be used, not wire welded mild steel tube chassis and suspension.

It seems as if the IRL technical leadership is lacking of defined intentions or expressed knowledge to lead manufacturers conceiving the new generation of Indy Car.

One more concern: a unique car manufacturer and one engine label will not renew the spectator’s interest as it was more than 10 years ago when constant changes and dramas of all kind were triggering people’s interests and siding for a chassis, an engine, a team, a driver and even a technical leader or any combinations of all the variables. Believing that a new car and new engine will change the face of this type of racing is showing a lack of connection with spectators and aficionados.

FIA and FOTA went both their way out to understand what spectators are expecting from the Formula 1 championship, and combined with their expertise and decisive directions, propose one exiting championship, towing behind full ranks of GP2, Formula 2, Renault World Series 3.5, Formula 3 and GP3 championships. Here, we just lost Atlantic and Indy Lights is dying with a car that has never been of great balance and interest, born of compromises and financial interests.

Europe got hit by the economic downturn more than the US, as they were already at a tougher position with eventually more pre-crisis unemployment than we ended up here post-implosion. Yet racing has continued evolving.

It would be insane for us to think adding a new Open Wheel racing series today, yet Europe had Formula 2 debuting last year with a full count of drivers and just got GP3 starting now and directly competing against the venerable and popular Formula 3. At the very first test of this new series, this past March 4th, thirty one, read again: 31 drivers were at work testing their new car.

Fourteen (14) drivers were testing at the first Indy Lights test a few days earlier, not all being confirmed to start the season. And the respected highly competitive Formula Atlantic series is gone, mismanaged and condemned by IRL as a non-viable stepping stone for young drivers. Afraid of any competition, IRL did destroy everything on their path, including themselves.

I hope someone is going to understand or accept the real reasons of the American Open Wheel racing’s demise, although, it is interesting to notice that Star Mazda is still going strong.

I think history has now enough depth to define the problems and allow pinpointing more precisely how they were generated.

The tough subject will be to find and put in place the right people to implement wise technical changes and regain what was the best Racing in USA.

New Indy Car Concept direction

It is interesting to follow the opinions of Indy Car fans through the various blogs, poles and forums. Recently, an overload of concerns has been expressed on the subject of the desirable look of the future race car, at the time the Indy Racing League is accepting project concepts from race car builders. Some lessons can certainly be taken from what we read and should be treated as an element of consideration among others for the IRL to make decisions.

On one hand, the Indy Car Honda concept car presented some time ago in 2009 shows some characters that mix traditional lines with futuristic appendixes. Nevertheless, let’s remember that this is a non-engineered styling studio elaboration with some unrealistic features. On the other hand, the race car manufacturers such as Dallara, Lola and Swift did introduce a few days ago some aggressive styles that, in some cases, could be impractical or costly. Most of the styles are reminiscent of ‘Hot Wheels” and ‘Star War” looks, which has not grasped major interests among the public. Of all the projects presented so far, the Delta Wing car mockup produced by the association of some Indy Car teams might be the most advanced and engineered concept vehicle to date, yet represent such a drastic change from a race car look and general architecture that it seems to be rejected by the public as a potential Indy Car replacement.

In any case, and without adding any oil to some of the already burning fires of controversy, I believe that the public taste should be an important element of the direction race car designers need to take. After all, FIA and FOTA did reached fans to understand them better and the public did like it. Nevertheless, we also have to remind fans that race cars are not conceived in design studios as a stylistic exercise. These vehicles are fully engineered with all forms and parts justified by defined functions based on the two main principles of performance and safety. The final “look” of a race car is the consequence of various integrated options that have virtually showed to offer beneficial outcomes.

It seems that the Delta Wing project is an expression of the needs for change, and not only in the car look and architecture, but in the managing of car and parts production and cost control, as well as the need for a new direction in more competitive racing, essentially meaning more potential for passing as well as diversification in winning teams and drivers.

I believe the answer to these needs is in a well conceived definition by the IRL of the direction to take, based on properly defined engineering concepts and understandings that will naturally define a style, not a style creating a vehicle with compromises to be engineered. In various instances, sanctioning bodies have lacked in engineering principle knowledge, dealing mainly with mechanical senses and reactionary fear imposing conservative rules.

Maybe the new Indy Car concept has to start by the capacity of the series to define the directions to take from which race car constructors would present projects. And as much as I understand the reasons of a one car manufacturer in managing production cost, I strongly believe that a variety of designs – two would be better than one – would help draw some interests back from spectators. This would be true as well with more than one engine manufacturer.

Ultimately, spectators are motivated by diversity, routing for a complex combination of drivers, teams, owners, car manufacturers, engines and even race engineers as performance contributors, as it has been the case by the past and still true in Formula 1 with designers. NASCAR did put forward drivers, car numbers, teams, car manufacturers and crew chiefs. Today, these cars seem to be looking the same with a spec-like chassis and almost identical shapes. One major element of the variable combinations got lost and so some fans did desert the tracks.

Who would run to an ice cream parlor if only 2 tastes and one cup size were available?

Still Crazy after all these (Racing) Years!

Difficult to fathom!

Forty height years of Motorsports. Although, I was already around Sports cars 9 years earlier, fascinated by their beauty… a dismantled engine under repair… an Italian fabricator forming a fender from a flat sheet of aluminum. I had my own mentor, patient with a kid. He was a French Basque and had been a master mechanic at the Bugatti factory. What a start in the racing world before knowing it!

I was 16 and the sparks in my eyes gave confidence to the chief mechanic, allowing me to port a Triumph TR2 cylinder head before a national rally. I was nicknamed “Alain-le-malin” (Alain-the-clever) as I was already searching to perfect anything I could have my hands on. I loved carburetors then… just like NASCAR even today!

Let’s see… Formula Junior 1000cc. Formula 1 without wing and skinny tires. Formula 3 1000cc, Triumph TR2, TR3, Abarth 600 Rally, Formula Vee, Formula Ford, Abarth 850 coupe, Alfa Romeo Giulia. Formula 2 with tubular chassis in 25cd4s and Formula 2 with aluminum tubs (drainage not included!). Lotus Elan GT. Porsche 904-6 Racing tested at 2:00 am in the streets of Brussels. Porsche 911 Carrera driven to Le Mans and back to Brussels after winning the GT category ahead of 14 similar cars including the factory... Did it a second time, although using an open trailer. Volvo 122, Porsche 914-6, Mini Cooper S with rubber or liquid suspension, Super Vee, Ford 2000, Formula 3 2000cc. Hill Climb Formula 3 chassis with Formula 2 engines. Group C. 5 times Le Mans with 2 category victories and more glories. A long list of Touring cars of all kinds and sizes including Front Wheel drives oversteering like an Escort Rally. Nissan GTP as project, team manager and race engineer. Restoration of vintage Shadow Can-Am and Formula 1. Years of CART Indy Cars, qualified 6 drivers at the 500’s and counting 2 fastest rookies of the year. Won a championship in the CART version of Indy Lights called “the real one”. Race engineer and aerodynamicist (chief, mind you!) in Formula 1, Ayrton Senna era. A few GT1 with unexpected results. IMSA WSC redesigned and championship winning and at Le Mans, qualified second a 12 year old Group C transformed in WSC at 1 tenth of the pole and on 4 laps only, as the same engine had to be used for the race. IRL with 1 win and other podiums on 7 races. Restoration of glorious vintage Sports cars. Designed and built a Sports 2000 with composite chassis. Champ Car with surprising results. Various Formula Atlantic with dominating results. Formula BMW. I know, I must forget a few…

While working in Open Wheel racing, people were talking about my experience in Sports car as an oddity. While working in Prototype, people were perceiving me as a hyper Formula car kind of guy. Lucien Bianchi and Vic Elford were my ultimate type of “pilots” capable of competing on top in F2, F1, Sports Prototype, World Rally and International Rally Raid, sometime during the same season. The real breed…No ballerina shoes here!

Mechanic, engine assembler from 2 to 8 cylinders (I miss the 12's). Fabricator, machinist, composite technician, shock engineer, track engineer, design engineer, research engineer and aerodynamicist (I did create new features including wings, still in use today, even in F1… or banned by the rules…). Team manager, project manager, chief engineer, general manager… Almost forgot: driver, technical auto journalist, reporter, PR, truck driver… Who knows what else!

I have been drinking and eating racing… and dust. Sliding on oil, gas, methanol. Drenched in brake-cleaner and boiling water. I have been surrounded by deafening noise. Stoically showered by rain, inadvertently baked by the sun and sizzled by overheated engines and brakes. I have worked 24-7 (don't think I'll do it again!). In freezing cold temperatures and burning 106 degree F. For great and fantastic team owners... dreadful ones as well and every kinds in between. Dealing with lack of money, lack of honesty, lack of understanding how it works. Learned a lot from everyone and still do today. Gained friends for life… many friends for life, thanks to all of them. I have made teams and drivers looking good, very good and better, always improving a car and human capacity.

I am searching for a job…… A place to expend on our human adventure and achieve the best possible results as I always do.

Beside engineering and designing aero, I am a brilliant team leader capable of creating, moving and transforming any program to reach the top, small or big, any championship, any Continent.

Tell a friend; You will be proud of me.                                                           

See you soon on a race track… Better be on my side!


PS: Thanks to all the Facebook Friends having read this post. I appreciate your time and interest. Leave me a comment or a message, I will treasure them all.

Lite for a Beer if you wish, not for Classical Music!

I get disturbed every time I read “Lite Classical Music”. I have never understood the association of classical music and a slang word for lowered alcohol content beer. “Lite” as “diet” soda beverage has an even worst identification, a beverage made with aspartame as sweetener with potential side effects, as this chemical product include methanol converting into formaldehyde under some conditions.

Is the “Lite Classical Music” a hazardous cocktail? An artificial sweetener? A hidden methanal concoction? A milder intoxicating brew? Or is it people trying to define some of the classical music in market term, “Lite” being the easiest to sell? I know, we discovered that cows were producing more milk when exposed to Mozart music, although, I believe Amadeus had no such intention when he was busy writing his composition. I sympathize with salespeople facing art for art; it is tough… the inspiration and creation for the sake of humanity; “what’s the point” they might say!

“Lite” or not, classical music represent far more than what our dismal education has or not portrayed. If we consider the Classical’s as Western music, we already miss the other sources such as Arabic, Chinese, Japanese, Korean and to some extend any formal folk music from around the world, being more of a traditional representation of a musical culture.

Periods such as Renaissance, Baroque, Classic, Romantic and Impressionist, to name a few, show very specific characters. The nation of origin among the Western Classicals represents distinctive signs of culture such as Russian composers being unique in comparison with Germans, Italians, French, Spanish, British, Polish… Western music is not limited to Europe as American and various South American composers embrace the same musical sources. I am fascinated by Takashi Yoshimatsu’s compositions as it blends Western and Japanese sounds, themes and orchestration. Classical music has no border as we say.

After all, Asians are avid adepts of Western classical music, expending from their ancient traditions and opening themselves to the world… I guess the opposite of what we tend to practice here… I have seen friends loosing their temper at the sounds of some classical music, asking me to stop “that”. I have seen people catching the temporary tempo of a symphony to find themselves looking wacky after the music abruptly slowed to an unrecognizable rhythm, followed by an acceleration of pace, again motivating our boeotians to get back on the beat and finding themselves once more in an embarrassing position. Some people mis-classify Jazz as "music for elevator" because it has no lyric! Not easy to understand the world and open to it when music only means Rock, whether classic, hart, punk, or Hip-Hop with its variations. Jazz being for old folks and Jazz-Fusion having been under popularized, Country is the genre one tend to love or hate with passion. Ultimately, music knowledge for the general American population ends up being songs of a form or another, no pure and simple music.

Classical music is also often presented as an invariable composition with no concept for interpretation, a sort of Cabernet without Millesime or Terroir… a dark red grape juice with alcohol… "Soothing" music, “Classical Thunder” and other typical commercial terms have no meaning as the music is an expression of artists, not a production aimed to move consumers in various defined forms of moods as a cheap therapy. Classical music is there to be appreciated outside oneself, allowing the music to reach instead of being controlled. It is a moment of contemplation during which one let the composers, interpreters and musicians communicating their combined feelings and allowing their emotions to blossom.

Light classical music would not make sense, as composers would not intentionally write a “less heavier” music for the sake of a lighter digestion or an easier understanding. “Lite” classical music is in reality an insult to the effort and involvement of composers, interpreters and musicians, as nothing “Lite” would have and would be satisfying them; classical music imply a total involvement with no restriction.

Personally, I like micro brew producing more intricate beer taste then “Lite”. Cheers to the Classical Music Lovers.