August 25, 2010
(Image © 2010 - John Thawley)
A proper motor race? Indeed. In an era when crackling good motor races are becoming few and far between, the ALMS delivered a scintillating show at Road America - America's National Park of Speed - last Sunday on a picture-perfect late summer Wisconsin afternoon. Jonny Cocker (No. 8 Drayson Racing Lola B09 60/Judd) went from fourth to first in the last four laps Sunday as Drayson Racing won the American Le Mans Series powered by eStar presented by Tequila Patrón, its first race win in the series. Cocker passed Klaus Graf (No. 6 Muscle Milk Team CytoSport Porsche RS Spyder) with two turns left at Road America and won by 1.051 seconds in the Lola-Judd coupe that he shares with Paul Drayson. Cocker was 6.295 seconds quicker than Graf, who drove with Timo Bernhard, on the final lap as Graf sputtered out of fuel. Drayson Racing became the fifth entrant to win overall in one season, the most in American Le Mans Series history. Chassis manufacturer Lola won for the second straight race and Judd power won overall for the first time since 1999. David Brabham and Simon Pagenaud (No. 1 Patrón Highcroft Racing HPD ARX-01c) finished third in LMP, 4.915 seconds behind the winners, but they still retained their championship lead in the class with two events remaining. Drayson Racing not only sat on pole for the second straight race and set the fastest race lap, the team won the LMP category in the MICHELIN® GREEN X® Challenge, a competition within the race that awards teams for overall performance and environmental efficiency. Gunnar Jeannette and Elton Julian (Green Earth Team Gunnar G-Oil Oreca FLM09) won in the LMP Challenge class for the third time this year. Jeannette finished 21 seconds ahead of class pole-winner Luis Diaz in the PR1/Mathiasen Motorsports entry he drove with Ricardo Gonzalez. Scott Tucker and Andy Wallace finished third in class for Level 5 Motorsports. Tucker and Level 5 retained the class championship lead by 4 points over Jeannette and GETG. Joey Hand and Dirk Müller (BMW Rahal Letterman Racing Team BMW M3 GT) won in GT for the second straight year at Road America finishing 2.617-seconds ahead of Patrick Long and Jörg Bergmeister (Flying Lizard Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 RSR). And Oliver Gavin and Olivier Beretta finished third in their Corvette C6.R. BMW now leads the manufacturer championship by six points over Porsche, and BMW Rahal Letterman Racing leads Flying Lizard by the same amount in the team standings. This was the first victory for BMW since it went 1-2 in class last year at Road America; Hand drove with Bill Auberlen in last year’s win. “I love this place. It’s one of the greatest race tracks I’ve ever seen,” Hand said. “I come here with a different attitude and a lot of motivation and ready to win here. Ever since my Formula Atlantic career I’ve had wins here. This RLR team, BMW, Dunlop… everything seemed to hook up here. We carry a lot of speed in the straights but it’s a lot about the corners and we have really good grip here. The car also did great on the brakes, it made it really easy to pass people. I drove it like it was a go-kart. I could just drive it anyway I wanted.” To underscore the white-hot competitiveness of GT2, the top nine cars in class finished on the lead lap. Team Falken Tire’s Porsche of Bryan Sellers and Wolf Henzler won the GT portion of the MICHELIN® GREEN X® Challenge. And in GT Challenge, Tim Pappas and Jeroen Bleekemolen (Black Swan Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup) won the class for the fourth time in five races. Bleekemolen crossed the finish line ahead of Galen Bieker/Robert Rodriguez in the WERKS II Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup. Vic Rice and Shane Lewis (Velox Motorsports Porsche 911 GT3 Cup) finished third after leading early. Check out John Thawley's sensational images from America's greatest natural-terrain road racing circuit here.
Next up for the ALMS is the Grand Prix of Mosport presented by Mobil 1. The eighth round of the 2010 season is set for 3:05 p.m. ET on Sunday, August 29 from Mosport International Raceway in Bowmanville, Ontario, Canada. SPEED will air the race starting at 4 p.m. ET with live radio coverage available on American Le Mans Radio presented by Porsche – a production of Radio Show Limited – as well as Sirius Channel 127 and XM Channel 242. Americanlemans.com will stream qualifying live starting at 4:15 p.m. ET on Saturday. Visit the Series’ schedule page for ticket and accommodation information. Live Timing and Scoring, track schedule, entry list and much, much more will be available on Racehub at americanlemans.com.
(ALMS)
Audi Sport is playing to win in an effort to regain its title at Petit Le Mans powered by MAZDA2 next month at Road Atlanta. Dindo Capello, Tom Kristensen and Allan McNish will drive one diesel-powered Audi R15 TDI while the trio of Marcel Fässler, André Lotterer and Benoit Treluyer will wheel the second LMP1 entry for the final round of the 2010 American Le Mans Series presented by Tequila Patrón. The two Audis will square-off against a pair of factory Peugeot 908s at the 2.54-mile, 12-turn natural-terrain road course in the second race of the new Intercontinental Le Mans Cup, a new global endurance racing championship from the Automobile Club de l’Ouest – the sanctioning body for the Le Mans 24 Hours. The other two rounds will be at Silverstone in the UK and Zhuhai, China. "Audi has been involved in sports prototype racing since 1999 and has had the vision of a worldwide racing series for these types of vehicles ever since,” says Head of Audi Motorsport Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich. “We’re delighted that the ACO is now translating this vision into reality. The Intercontinental Le Mans Cup gives us the opportunity to compete with our sports prototypes in very important markets.” This year’s Petit Le Mans is scheduled for September 29-October 2 at Road Atlanta.
(ALMS)
Already champions of this year's 24 Hours of Le Mans, the trio of Timo Bernhard, Romain Dumas and Mike Rockenfeller will make more history this year, this time for Porsche. The trio returns to the American Le Mans Series presented by Tequila Patrón as teammates in the Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid for Petit Le Mans powered by MAZDA2 at Road Atlanta. The innovative Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid - a showcase for Porsche's new “Porsche Intelligent Performance” image/technology push - features two electric motors on the front axles, each developing 60 kilowatts to supplement the 480 horsepower normally-aspirated rear-mounted engine. Under braking, the 911 GT3 R Hybrid converts kinetic energy into electrical energy and stores it in a flywheel that spins up to 40,000 rpm. During acceleration, this energy is delivered to the front wheels, supporting the combustion engine. This leads to a reduction in fuel consumption, increasing the cruising range and lessens the need for refueling pitstops. The Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid, which led the overall classification at this year’s Nürburgring 24 hour race for more than eight hours, demonstrated the potential of its groundbreaking technology over the first 22 hours and 15 minutes of the race before dropping out. The Porsche 911 GT3 R Hybrid will not be eligible for points, as hybrid technology is not yet included in the GT regulations. "Our priorities are to further develop the hybrid technology and to optimize the fuel consumption under racing conditions. Nevertheless, I’m very interested to see how we compare to the GT2 cars,” says Timo Bernhard. “Nowhere is the competition in the GT segment as hard as it is here in the USA,” adds Dumas.
(Jim Haines/IndyCar)
Will Power (No. 12 Verizon Team Penske Honda-Powered Dallara) had 'em all covered again this week, this time in the IZOD IndyCar Series Indy Grand Prix of Sonoma at Infineon Raceway. Power rocketed away from the pole and was as fast as he needed to be all day long, holding-off Scott Dixon (No. 9 Target Chip Ganassi Racing D/H/F) by 0.7432 of a second on the 2.303-mile, 12-turn natural-terrain course. Dario Franchitti (No. 10 Target Chip Ganassi Racing D/H/F) finished third. Power now leads Franchitti by 59 points with just four races remaining - all on oval tracks.
(Ron McQueeney/IndyCar)
Scott Dixon didn't have an answer for Power last Sunday.
(Ron McQueeney/IndyCar)
Franchitti trails Power by 59 points in the Izod IndyCar Championship point standings with four races to go. Next up for the series is the PEAK Antifreeze & Motor Oil Indy 300 on Aug. 28 at Chicagoland Speedway. The race will be telecast in high-definition by VERSUS at 7 p.m. The race will also be broadcast by the IMS Radio Network and on XM Satellite Radio 145 and Sirius 212.
(Jim Haines/IndyCar)
This was Will Power's fifth victory of the 2010 season. His previous wins came at Sao Paulo, St. Petersburg, Watkins Glen and Toronto. He also received the trophy for IndyCar's first Mario Andretti Road Racing Championship. "What a perfect weekend," Power said afterwards." It was an awesome race. Dixon certainly had a good pace at the end there but I had a bit of pick up on my tires. I just have to thank the Verizon guys and Roger (Penske) and Tim (Cindric) for giving me this opportunity. A year ago I was lying in the hospital after taking a ride in a helicopter and watching the race in there, so to come back and win it from the pole is just fantastic. I've said it all season, I wanted to come back here and win this race." (Asked about the last four oval races): "I'm going for it. I want to win the championship and I want to win an oval before the year is out and this overall championship."
(Jim Haines/IndyCar)
J.K. Vernay (No. 7 Lucas Oil/CJ/Sam Schmidt Motorsports) held off Charlie Kimball (No. 26 Levemir FlexPen for AFS Racing Andretti Autosport) over the final 10 laps to win the Carneros 100 by 3.4245 seconds. It was Vernay's fifth victory of the season (all on road/street courses) increasing his Firestone Indy Lights championship points lead to 71. James Hinchcliffe finished third in the No. 2 TMR-Xtreme Coil Drilling machine. The final three races of the season are on 1.5-mile ovals. Next up for the series is the Chicagoland 100 on Aug. 28 at Chicagoland Speedway.
Editor-in-Chief's Note: Think the rules package for the "new" IndyCar chassis coming in 2012 is etched in stone, a done deal, and signed, sealed and delivered? Think again. As always Robin Miller is the guy with the inside story when it comes to major league open-wheel racing here in the U.S. Read his latest report here. - PMD
Editor-in-Chief's Note: If you really must keep up on all of the latest F1 developments and the potential U.S. GP in Austin, Texas, go here. - PMD
Editor-in-Chief's Note: Check out Michelin's racing website - "Michelin Alley" - and get in on all of the behind-the-scenes buzz. Go here. - PMD
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