RESULTS – SUBARU ROAD RACING TEAM

PERFORMANCE PROFILE: DAVE ROSENBLUM

WITH DECADES OF ROAD-RACING EXPERIENCE AS A DRIVER AND TEAM OWNER, DAVE ROSENBLUM PLAYS A KEY ROLE IN SUBARU ROAD RACING TEAM’S CAMPAIGN IN THE GRAND-AM KONI CHALLENGE SERIES™ ST CLASS.

Subaru Road Racing Team Legacy 2.5GT spec.B #111 and #141 campaigned in the Grand-Am KONI Challenge Series Street Tuner class at Daytona International Speedway^® in January 2008.

A road racer since the 1960s, Rosenblum has co-partnered with Joe Aquilante, another road-racing veteran, to form ICY Racing/Phoenix Performance. They field both Subaru Road Racing Team (SRRT) Subaru Legacy^® 2.5GT spec.B cars in the KONI Challenge. Car #111 is driven by Chuck Hemmingson and Kristian Skavnes, and #141 is driven by Dave Rosenblum, Andrew Aquilante, and/or Don Knowles, depending on the event. (Each event requires a mandatory driver change.)

Drive Performance sat down with Rosenblum during a testing session in Lime Rock Park in May 2008, to find out more about him.

A Conversation with Dave Rosenblum – Excerpts

Was there any one thing that made you interested in cars and racing?

When I was little, I somehow took some books out of the library – stock car racing and all these kind of books. At the age of 11, I started reading stuff like that. And I started paying attention to it.

And then, in high school, I sort of gravitated to the guys who liked cars. We were the more serious guys that used to spend our Friday nights looking for winding roads, driving our parents’ cars, and nearly killing ourselves.

In college, I bought my first sports car – a TR250. Prior to that, I had a couple of used sports cars – a TR3, some Mini Coopers, and a whole assortment of cars. But my first, brand-new, real sports car was a Triumph TR250. Within six months I had an extra set of wheels and some Goodyear Blue Streak racing tires and started autocrossing.

And then I won the Delaware Valley championship somewhere around ’67 and ’68 – constantly doing autocrossing.

Then my parents gave me a college graduation present – they sent me to Israel for the summer. I traded in my airplane ticket – without their permission – and spent four and a half weeks at the Henry Morrogh driving school in Monza, Italy, living at the track, camping out, and learning how to drive Formula Fords.

Top to bottom: Subaru Road Racing Team meeting at Lime Rock Park in 2007; Rosenblum at Lime Rock Park test in 2008; testing #141 at Lime Rock Park in 2008.

What was the hardest lesson you had to learn about racing?

The hardest thing about racing is not the car stuff. It’s learning how to manage the sponsorship end. That’s the difficulty.

From the driving point of view, it’s learning how to concentrate, learning how to talk yourself into “smoother is faster, and what feels faster is slower.” Even after 40 years, the real smooth, nice laps that are really quick feel like, “OK, I can go quicker.” And then when you go quicker, you end up going slower because you make mistakes – not mistakes. You scrub off speed, or you’re just doing little things. Those are probably the biggest lessons that you have to learn.

How long did it take you to learn it?

I’m still learning.

What would you say was your most memorable race?

It’s not so much which race was the best. In my position, it was winning a Manufacturers’ Championship in World Challenge for Saturn^®. That was real terrific – helping Volkswagen win their Manufacturers’ Championship the year we won the 24-hours.

One of the more memorable races was my first pro win at West Palm Beach in a Firehawk race. That was probably five years after I got out of rehab. I had spent the years from 17 to 34 being a “pharmaceutical major” and never, ever succeeding at anything because of the addiction at that time, and then I got sober and everything started going good for me. One of the things that was hard to accept was that I could be successful at something where I had 17 years of reinforced “Nothing ever works out.” So I think the first win on a professional stage was a memorable moment. I broke the ice. I can do this. That was a turnaround moment.

What makes you keep racing?

There are lots of things. One is being able to compete with young, good, fast drivers – that’s a perk in itself.

Another thing I enjoy is the feeling of going out there, driving the car as fast as I can, putting it on the limit – that feeling of excitement. That rush. Coming down the hill here at Lime Rock where the car is teetering at the edge of control, and you know that you might just drop a wheel off into the dirt. You do that, and it gets hairy. And constantly doing that lap after lap, having that concentration, and being able to just do it and do it and do it. That’s what keeps me going. Our Subaru cars give me the confidence to push my limits. There aren’t too many other things that give me that kind of feeling.

Find more about Dave Rosenblum and SRRT in back issues of Drive Performance at www.driveperformance.subaru.com and at www.icyracing.com.