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"  DeltaWing ALMS champion Gunnar Jeanette has made a career out of driving oddball prototypes, which made him a natural choice to pilot the DeltaWing. I can&amp;#039;t think of a more fitting driver than Gunnar Jeanette to pilot the DeltaWing at October&amp;#039;s 10-hour/1000-mile Petit Le Mans where he&amp;#039;ll share the All American Racers-built car with Spain&amp;#039;s Lucas Ordonez as the entire team looks to improve upon the premature end that befell its debut at Le Mans in June. Video window may take a few moments to load... As the son of peerless Porsche restorer, racer and raconteur Kevin Jeanette, the 30-year-old Florida native got his hands on some of the most unique sports cars around while still in his teens and continues to build upon that repertoire. He&amp;#039;s driven the Gunnar 966\u2014the open-top Porsche 962 his father built and named in his honor, the crazy front-engined Panoz LMP-1 Roadster, Corsa Motorsports&amp;#039; Zytek-Zytek\u2014the first KERS-equipped prototype to race in the ALMS, and now, after a three-day test at Road Atlanta, the hopelessly different DeltaWing has been added to his resume.   1992 Gunnar 966 Jeanette&amp;#039;s driven plenty of normal racing cars throughout his career, but as sports car&amp;#039;s master of misfit toys, I was curious to learn how the projectile-shaped, Nissan turbo-powered prototype ranked among the rest of the oddballs. &amp;quot;Honestly...leaving the pits...by Turn 3 at Road Atlanta...it felt like a normal racecar,&amp;quot; he told RoadandTrack.com. &amp;quot;All of that is a huge credit to Ben Bowlby&amp;#039;s design. For something as radically different as it is, to be able to leave pit lane and have it register as a normal racecar within a few moments is a testament to Ben and the entire Nissan DeltaWing team.&amp;quot;   DeltaWing After earning the 2011 ALMS LMPC drivers&amp;#039; championship with co-driver Ricardo Gonzalez, Jeanette&amp;#039;s spent the 2012 season driving touring cars like Ford&amp;#039;s new Focus ST-R in GRAND-AM and Luxury Racing&amp;#039;s Ferrari F458 in the FIA World Endurance Championship, but says adapting to a prototype\u2014even a radical version of the concept\u2014came easily. &amp;quot;It takes some different things driving style wise, like any new car, but it&amp;#039;s a real pleasure to drive,&amp;quot; he explained. &amp;quot;I thought it was going to be more difficult with the wide rear end and not really knowing where your tires are placed, but that wasn&amp;#039;t a problem at all. The front...you honestly don&amp;#039;t even notice it. You&amp;#039;re sitting low, and your eyes are focused so far ahead, you don&amp;#039;t even notice how narrow it is. It&amp;#039;s kind of, in a way, similar to the first laps I did in the Panoz LMP1 car.   Panoz LMP-1 Roadster &amp;quot;You&amp;#039;re sitting so far back\u2014almost by the rear axle\u2014and there&amp;#039;s so much car in front of you, but you touch the curbs a couple of times and get a feel for where [the front tires are] and it automatically gets set into your subconscious. And then you drive it like any other racecar.&amp;quot; Along with a fair amount of suspension testing, Jeanette and Ordonez worked with DeltaWing technical partner Michelin to shape the next-generation tires it will use for Petit Le Mans.   DeltaWing &amp;quot;Right now we have Le Mans-spec tires on the car,&amp;quot; he said. &amp;quot;Michelin put a lot of work into those tires and now that we&amp;#039;re doing Petit Le Mans, we&amp;#039;re working on more developments for this track. In general, it&amp;#039;s just great to work with the team and Michelin on this car. We&amp;#039;ve gotten to do some radically different things than you&amp;#039;d normally do with a racecar. The Nissan DeltaWing is unique enough that you can play with cambers and toes and other settings at the front like you&amp;#039;d never try elsewhere. I&amp;#039;m having a lot of fun and can say I genuinely can&amp;#039;t wait to get back and drive the car again.&amp;quot; Jeanette and his merry band of eccentrics will roll off the grid at Road Atlanta for the ALMS season finale on October 20, 2012. Related posts:  DeltaWing To Race In America DeltaWing: All Skate \u2013 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans An End To The DeltaWing&amp;#039;s Debut \u2013 2012 24 Hours of Le Mans  "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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