I had the opportunity to go to the Las Vegas Formula One race and it was an amazing experience and race! I was fortunate enough to get invited to attend the race with one of my Vintage customers who has connections with Caesar's Entertainment so we were treated very well.
My dad and I flew out Friday morning and arrived in time for FP3 and qualifying. We pushed through our jet lag to stay up late enough to see the end of qualifying and it was so fun to see the F1 car on track under the lights of Vegas. We watched qualifying from the Apex of Turn 1 and to see the braking capabilities of the F1 cars up close was incredible. The race on Saturday night was extremely entertaining and competitive. Overall, it was a great experience to be a part of. A lot of work went into making that race happen but I felt it was worth it. I hope it continues for many years to come.
Even though I was able to break away for a weekend, that doesn’t mean we haven’t been busy around the shop since the season ended. We have been doing much needed maintenance and cleaning on all our equipment as well as greatly organizing the shop. We have been wrapping up projects on the vintage cars as well as putting all the LMP3s back together in track ready condition. We have inventoried, sorted and labeled all of our spare parts, tools and equipment. We have cleared out a significant section of the front part of the shop in order to receive the United LMP2 cars and equipment.
For the last week, the two trailers and two tractors have been in the shop getting converted to United Autosports livery. That has been a big project and it's been fun to watch them slowly transition from white to UAS Blue.
We have not received any cars or equipment from United yet. There are two containers on the water as we speak that are due to land in Charleston by the end of the month. Those will get trucked to the shop and unloaded. The cars will not arrive until the first week of December. We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the equipment and cars to get started on our new program for 2024.
We are all excited to be working with United for the first time at the upcoming Daytona test. Most of the guys from United in the UK will be coming to our shop the week prior to the test to prepare the cars and get to know us so we are excited for the first opportunity to work side by side with them. The test should be a good shakedown dress rehearsal for the big event in January. There is gonna be a lot of work to get everything ready in time for Daytona but we are all up for the challenge!