Benoit Treluyer, Andre Lotterer and Marcel Fassler won the 79th Le Mans 24 Hours in the #2 Audi Sport Team Joest R18, 13.854 seconds ahead of the #9 Peugeot of Simon Pagenaud, Sebastien Bourdais and Pedro Lamy. It was an exciting race as Audi and Peugeot battled throughout, exchanging leads several times during the night and early morning. The race was marred by two serious incidents that took out two of the three font running Audis, both involved slower cars from the GTE-Pro class. Allan McNish crashed out in the…
Read MoreCategory: Sports Cars
Updates on sports car racing in European Le Mans Series, World Endurance Championship, American Le Mans Series, and United SportsCar Championship
Second Audi Involved in Horrific Crash
The #1 Audi R18 of defending Le Man winner Mike ‘Rocky’ Rockefeller has been involved in a violent shunt with a slower GTE car at the high speed kink between Mulsanne and Indianapolis corner. Audi Sport has confirmed that Rockefeller was able to get out of the car himself that he spoke to the team and has been taken to the hospital. Rockefeller was overtaking one the AF Corse Ferrari 458s on the straightaway leading up to Indianapolis when the Ferrari inexplicably started to move into the path of the…
Read MoreMcNish Survives Massive Crash
Allan McNish survived a massive crash that put the #3 Audi out of this year’s Le Mans 24 Hours in the first hour of racing. McNish was attempting to pass teammate Timo Bernhard for the lead in the esses after the Dunlop Bridge, but as he past Bernhard’s Audi the Luxury Racing #58 Ferrari 458 GTE of Anthony Beltoise, also racing for position, moved over and clipped the Audi sending both cars off course. McNish’s Audi appeared to glide and skipped across gravel trap, becoming airborne and slamming into the…
Read MoreFIA Endurance Championship Official
More details of the 2012 FIA World Endurance Championship were shared today during an ACO press conference at Le Mans. ACO President Jean-Claude Plassart and FIA President Jean Todt presented the main championships guidelines during. As recently reported on openpaddock.net the new Championship series will mirror the current ILMC series. There will be six races plus Le Mans. Two will be in North America, most likely at Sebring and Petit Le Mans at the Road Atlanta circuit. Two will be in Europe in addition to Le Mans, and two races…
Read MoreLeMans – Dayton,Bowlby, and Gurney Discuss DeltaWing’s LeMans Aspirations
LeMans – DeltaWing Partners with Gurney and Highcroft for 2012’s 24 Hour
Ben Bowlby’s DeltaWing concept has not faded into the past, as much as many IndyCar fans may wish it. The concept lives and will make an appearance in a place where we here at OpenPaddock had thought it was best suited from the beginning, endurance sports car racing. After all, the concept originally produced and displayed at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway in May 2010 could only very loosely have been called an open-wheel car. It genuinely does resemble a prototype sports car more than a single-seater formula car. However, that…
Read MoreLe Mans Notes 06/08/11; Sarrazin Peugeot Set Pace
Just as it appeared Audi had lay claim to the top three positions during provisional qualifying Peugeot Sport Total‘s Stephane Sarrazin peeled off a blistering lap that undercut the German squad by nine-tenths of a second during an incident packed session. The Audi Sport Team Joest R18 TDI’s and Team Peugeot Sport Total 908’s were fastest throughout the session. The 908 of Sebring winners Team Oreca Matmut were seventh in LMP1. The Pescarlo Judd was the fastest of the petrol powered LMP cars, in eighth position, nearly two seconds ahead of…
Read MorePreview; Le Mans 24 Hours
And so it begins this Saturday. The 79th running of the Le Mans 24 Hours, without question the world’s greatest sports car race and arguably the world greatest racing event, 56 cars, in four classes, lapping the famed Circuit de la Sarthe at nearly 75% full throttle per lap. 28 LMP cars (Le Mans Prototype) will start. New LMP1 cars from Audi, Peugeot and Aston Martin will battle for the overall win. Even with new regulations to bridge the gap between diesel and petrol powered cars, the factory teams hold…
Read MoreFIA, ACO Announce World Endurance Championship
The FIA and the ACO, organizers of the 24 Hours at Le Mans and the Intercontinental Le Mans Championship (ILMC) have announced a World Endurance Championship starting in 2012. There will be a manufacturer’s championship and driver championship. The FIA press release stated “In establishing this new category of motorsport championship, both the FIA and ACO are keenly aware it needs to be a laboratory for innovation and the development of new technologies, allowing motor manufacturers to express, through the rigours of competition, their ability to be inventive and, as…
Read MorePart IV:New Direction Needed for IMSA-ALMS
The 2011 American Le Mans Series season will (likely) widely be remembered as the one with two very successful events, Sebring and Petit Le Mans, a very questionable television/broadcast package with ABC, ESPN2 and ESPN3.com that fans and some media are very critical of and other than the ALMS serious fan, some other races. What’s this you say? Have you lost your mind? The season is only two races old, we’re in the Le Mans break, Lime Rock is but a month away, we got bunch a great races leading…
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