In a wide-ranging conversation Thursday, Muscle Milk Pickett Racing team principal Greg Pickett made a definitive statement about whatever plans he'll be doing for the 2014 season combining Grand-Am and ALMS: They don't include the current Grand-Am Daytona Prototype class.
“I will say – on record – I'm not going, or interested in going – DP racing. I can say that. I will say that,” he said.
Pickett currently fields the HPD ARX-03a in ALMS, one of only three full-season P1 class cars from two teams (Dyson Racing is the other). But after ALMS founder Dr. Don Panoz's comment during Wednesday's press conference about the joint series not embracing P1, Pickett says the series needs to take a hard look at what its top prototype class should be.
“The WEC [FIA World Endurance Championship] is an event of basically LMP1 cars and some people who like to travel,” Panoz said.
“I don't think (the lack of P1) it's because of a lack of fan interest, but I think we can create a class that does it economically and reasonably,” Pickett said. “We don't have to drive spaceships around. There's WEC and the great 24-hour classic at Le Mans.
“There's a danger in dumbing this down,” he added. “I think, let's be real here. There is a realization on Jim France's part… I knew there would be a question mark around P1. Let's see what we come up with. They can be exciting and look and sound exciting – to own, to drive, to watch. I'm pretty confident that even Grand-Am and France isn't sure DP is filling that bill. I think there's some admission it's something it's less than he wanted [it] to be. Let's get innovative and see what we can do there.”