Backstretch Motorsports

The raw numbers from Sebring don’t paint a pretty picture for Bell Motorsports: their GT1 Aston Martin DBR9 piloted by Terry Borcheller, Chapman Ducote and Antonio Garcia finished 29 laps down on the class-winning Corvette of Johnny O’Connell, Ron Fellows and Jan Magnussen … and 21 laps in arrears of the sister Corvette of Olivier Beretta, Oliver Gavin and Max Papis even though the latter car lost time replacing a broken halfshaft.

Speed? Well the two Corvettes posted fastest laps of 1:57.087 and 1:57.802, respectively while the best Borcheller could manage in the DBR9 was a 1:59.802 - a two-second differential that more or less echoed the times set in practice.

[read more...]

Audi Takes LMP1 Class Win; O’Connell,Corvette Easily Win GT1
Flying Lizards Break Through with 1-2 GT2 Finish

If the grueling Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Fresh from Florida is an indicator, the 2008 ALMS campaign will be another record book season for Penske Racing Porsce RS Spyders. Timo Bernhard, Romain Dumas and Emmanuel Collard drove to an historic overall win at the 56th running of the American endurance classic.

Proving the computer simulations that show the LMP2 class to have a distinct advantage over their LMP1 counterparts, the lighter prototypes stole the thunder from the higher horsepower , heavier machines — the first overall win at Sebring by an LMP2 car that was further punctuated by four P2 lead-lap finishers, a race record. Dumas took the checkered flag by 12.979 seconds over Adrian Fernandez in the Lowe’s Fernandez Racing Acura ARX-01b he shared with Luis Diaz. The P2 class swept the overall podium with Dyson Racing’s Porsche RS Spyder of Butch Leitzinger, Marino Franchitti and Andy Lally placing third.

[read more...]

Allan McNish (above) gave Audi pole position for Saturday’s 56th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Fresh from Florida after the grid for the season-opening race for the American Le Mans Series was set by practice times. Because the prototype field had less than 10 minutes of green-flag qualifying time, the results from the session were disallowed.

As a result, McNish’s Audi R10 TDI will start on the inside front row based on his time of 1:43.195 (129.076 mph) in Thursday morning’s official practice session. He will start alongside the Peugeot 908 of Pedro Lamy, Nic Minassian and Stephane Sarrazin, which posted the second quickest time of the week at 1:44.27 (127.744 mph). Like the Audi, the Peugeot set its best time Thursday morning.

[read more...]

Nic Minassian and Peugeot were fastest in Wednesday afternoon’s practice session at Sebring.

Things are starting to heat up at Sebring International Raceway. Nic Minassian went to the top of the timing chart Wednesday afternoon with a lap of 1:45.989 (125.673 mph) for Peugeot in the day’s second practice session for the 56th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Fresh from Florida. The factory diesel-powered LMP1 is racing in North America for the first time.

The top spot in each of the week’s previous sessions has alternated between Peugeot’s 908 and the Audi R10 TDI. That’s appropriate because Minassian said the surface at Sebring has changed just as often.

“Everything is OK with the car,” he said. “But it’s amazing how much the track changes from day to day. It’s really a learning experience. While I’ve done quite a bit of testing this year, I have been on the shorter side of the circuit more often testing for other series. But it’s good to get as much work as possible for this race.”

[read more...]

Two Audi R10 TDI cars at 12-hour race in Florida (USA)
Audi R8 TDI Le Mans on display in Sebring paddock
Audi to join US race track’s “Hall of Fame”

Ingolstadt/Sebring – AUDI AG once again demonstrated its courage to innovate and pioneering spirit with the vision to build a diesel-powered sportscar capable of winning the 24 Hours of Le Mans. In the meantime the revolutionary Audi R10 TDI has won twice at Le Mans, and remains unbeaten in its class after 21 races.

In the forthcoming week, Audi Sport returns with the near 650-hp diesel sportscar to the scene where the success story started two years ago: At the 12-hour race at Sebring (US state of Florida), two Audi R10 TDI prototypes line up on the grid driven by Dindo Capello/Tom Kristensen/Allan McNish and Lucas Luhr/Mike Rockenfeller/Marco Werner. On 18 March 2006, the R10 TDI won at Sebring on its race debut. It was the first victory for a diesel engine in an important sportscar race.

[read more...]