Lyn Celebrates with a Drink of Milk during Second Annual SVRA Brickyard Invitational

In her own words, Lyn describes her podium finish at the 2015 SVRA Brickyard Vintage Racing Invitational…

I was excited about racing in the Second Annual SVRA Brickyard Vintage Racing Invitational on June 9-14, 2015.

The plan was to compete in the Pro-Am, along with 32 other Indy 500 veterans in whatever car I was assigned. I was also entered in a 1988 Swift DB4 owned by Kurt Hansen. The Swift didn’t make it, so it was going to be a one-race event for me.

For the Pro-Am, I originally was paired with the owner of a 1969 Corvette, but when I sat in it I basically disappeared. The owner was over 6′ tall and if we tried to get enough cushions so I could see I was literally out of the seat. After sitting in about five other cars Tony Parella, President of SVRA, helped me find one: a Cobra Mark IV – car #28 – that belonged to John McCormack out of Nashville TN. One small cushion and we were good to go!

As I walked to the driver’s meeting late in the day I ran into Bruce Foss of Hoosier Tire. When I mentioned that the Swift wasn’t coming he asked if I wanted to run in the 90-minute enduro on Sunday morning. Naturally, I said sure! So, after the driver’s meeting, I stopped back in their garage and met Kris of K-Hill Motorsports and Bruce Hamilton, the owner of a 2008 Dallara Indy Lights #85 (he also was running a beautiful Brabham). We worked on seeing if I could fit in the car, which we were able to make happen. I spoke to Ray Snowden, SVRA Chief Steward, to see if I could take a few laps in another group practice session the next day. We worked it out.  So I got a few laps of practice in.

One cool opportunity happened when I was told the Indy Lights car was last raced by Matthew Brabham – of the famous Brabham family. I ran into Geoff Brabham and when I told him what car I was running he stopped over and we got a nice photo with him and the owner, Bruce Hamilton.

Meanwhile, when we were scheduled to do some practice laps in the Pro-Am cars it was raining so we only got a few laps behind the pace car. We were able to get in a few hardship laps early Saturday morning.

Saturday was the Pro-Am. All the owners were required to start the 50-minute race and required to do a minimum of 3-laps; and there was one required 5-minute pit stop. Unfortunately John McCormack was taken out by Eliseo Salazar so I didn’t get a chance to run.

On Sunday our enduro race was scheduled to start at 9:50am. The plan was for me to start so they could just pull me out with all my padding and since we were required to make two 5-minute pit stops it wouldn’t hurt us to do a driver change. A Porsche dropped a bunch of oil on the front straight so we all had to pit while they cleaned up the track.

After a long delay we got out and I ran about 30-minutes then came in for our driver change. Bruce got in and I watched him turn some amazing, competitive, consistent laps and climb the leader board. We finished in 2nd place!!! So we were able to stand on the podium in victory circle at the famed Indianapolis Motor Speedway and drink the traditional milk! What an awesome opportunity!!