For immediate release.
Montreal, Canada March 22, 2006.

Bitter sweet weekend !

The first round of the Indy Racing Leagues (IRL) “Stars of Karting” championship took place this past weekend on the very fast Norman, Oklahoma circuit. The first round of the year is a special feature event as it is a double points paying event and draws all the drivers together from the West and East coast Stars championship prior to moving back to each of their respective championships for the balance of the year. This means that over 75 drivers in the ICC shifter class had to fight for the 34 available grid slots for the Sunday afternoon final. Drivers come from all over the world to participate in this championship. The U.S, Canada, Puerto Rico, Guatemala, Brazil, Mexico, Great Britain among others.

Marc arrived very late on Thursday night after 18 hours of travel having missed all his connections from Calgary due to poor weather conditions. He was nonetheless still in an up beat mood on arrival.

Practice:
Friday was an open practice/test day. Due the sheer number of competitors in the ICC class, 2 groups were created based on “even” and “odd” kart numbers and each group went out separately onto the track. By the end of the day Marc had set the 6th fastest time of his group of 37 drivers. Weather conditions at this point had gone from cold but dry to wet and cold.

Qualifying:
Saturday dawned and it was raining from the word go. Again the ICC drivers were split into groups for qualifying and Marc set an excellent 5th fastest time. The other group went out under less wet conditions when they set their times. The officials then took the times from each group and used that to determine the groups for the pre-final races that would allow entry in to the final on Sunday. Only the top 15 in each pre-final group would automatically move into the final feature race. The concept of 2 qualifying groups normally works if the weather conditions are constant but in this case they weren’t. This meant that Marc (who had qualified in wetter conditions) found himself “gridded” in the “fast “group as he had set the 16th best time overall.

Pre-final:
For Marc’s pre-final event he was to go out after the first group had finished their race. The first race began and after only one lap was “red flagged” (stopped) due to a massive pile up and resulting injuries caused by the atrocious weather conditions and poor visibility. A re-start was ordered and again, after only 2 laps, the race was “red flagged”. The officials then took the decision to send out Marc’s group while the other group made repairs to their machines. It was now really raining hard and getting dark.

Marc started his race knowing well that all it would take was a 15th place or better and he was confident that that should not present a problem. At the start he made a safe start and held his position for the first lap while behind him back there was another bunch of drivers who got into a “group accident”. No red flag this time though. The race continued on and Marc gradually worked his way up to 12th by just before mid distance point. Participation in the final was assured it seemed. On the next lap, while heading onto a the back straight in 6th gear (150 KPH / 90 MPH), Marc felt a sudden impact and realized (as it was happening) that he had hit another competitor who had spun out on the track in front of him (remember he couldn’t see more than 6 feet in front of him). He ricocheted off the other machine but the steering wheel spun on impact and the spokes caught Marc’s hands and left wrist. With a completely deranged steering mechanism Marc continued on for another 4 laps as he had thought that he had seen the officials give “2 laps to go “signal”. It had in fact been the “half distance “ signal but he couldn’t tell as, on top of everything, he had water inside his visor and on the lenses of his glasses and really was driving blind. At this point Marc’s kart was scraping the ground and not turning properly and it felt like diving a truck without power steering. Once he realized that it was futile, he pulled into the pits very disappointed, in great pain and pulled off his blood soaked gloves. He had gashes on his hands and left wrist. A quick trip to the medical unit and he felt that he would be OK for the next day. Yes, there was still a slim chance of making the final.

Last chance:
On Sunday, before the final race, the organizers put on a “last chance” race. This is a short 10 lap race where the top 6 finishers get to participate in the final main event, albeit from the back of the grid. Marc was starting from the 18th spot on the grid in the “last chance” race and there were over 40 other drivers all trying for a top 6 finish. The remarkable Steve Pinet (Marc’s engineer) had worked until midnight on Saturday rebuilding Marc’s machine such that by the short Sunday morning practice session Marc said the machine felt perfect again. It was going to be a tough challenge but Marc, in spite of his cuts and bruises, felt up to it. At the start (still in soaking conditions) Marc made up 5 positions and found himself in 13th. After 5 laps he was up to 10th. With 2 laps to go he was in 9th and catching the heated battle for 6th. On the last 2 laps he tried everything running at a pace that was half a second quicker than the drivers in 4th to 6th positions. By the last lap he was rubbing his karts nose against the 3 battling in front of him for 6th but it was not to be. He had run out of laps.

Positives:
Marc tried to look at the positives of the weekend, although obviously very disappointed. He has shown that he is now a vastly improved driver compared to last year. He is capable, in difficult conditions, of setting times equal or better than many of the acknowledged stars of the series. His climb through the field in the “last chance” race had many people talking about him and they know he is a force to be reckoned with.

Next event:
There is a long gap between this last race and the next. The next event will take place in New Castle, Indiana on the weekend of May 20-21. There is however a possibility of some testing before. The PSL Team will be providing Marc with 2 brand new 2006 CRG’s and they are technically quite different from his 2005 mounts. A test session will be very useful in learning these 2006 machine idiosyncrasies.

HSBC Bank, Link International, Les Disques RSB, OPSIA Information Technologies, Cordeau/Clément & Associates (Attorneys), “California Pizza” Restaurants, LeMaitreD.com (Purveyors of fine gourmet foods) and KBHNS (Chartered Accountants), are all proud sponsors of Marc Flood.

Contacts:
Miles Flood: (514) 591 0032