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Archive for July, 2006

Audi R8 wins in its final race

Published July 2, 2006 in ALMS, Audi, Racing and Watched. 0 Comments

Audi’s Grand Old Girl is going out just like she came in – a winner in the American Le Mans Series. Allan McNish drove past Romain Dumas with 30 minutes left as the Scot and Rinaldo Capello won the New England Grand Prix on Saturday at Lime Rock Park.

McNish and Capello were winners by 11.812 seconds over the Penske Racing Porsche RS Spyder of Timo Bernhard and Romain Dumas. It marked the 48th overall victory for the Audi R8 in the American Le Mans Series and the 50th class win for the most successful race car in Series history.

The R8 will be replaced starting in two weeks at Salt Lake City’s Miller Motorsports Park by two diesel-powered Audi R10 TDIs, which won at both Sebring and Le Mans earlier this year. But for one more day, the R8 took center stage.

“I’m not an emotional person, my wife can attest to that,” McNish said. “But I had tears in my eyes coming out of the last corner, and I tapped the hood because she (the R8) has done anything I’ve ever asked of her. She even saved my life at Le Mans. We’re looking forward to the R10 TDI but it’s still hard to say goodbye because she has been so much a part of my career. It was the only fitting end the R8 should have.”

After running steady in the early part, McNish took advantage of traffic coming into the final turn and went three-wide with one of the Aston Martins and the Porsche of Dumas at the 2:15 mark. That was all McNish needed as he pulled away late.

“After warm-up this morning, we weren’t that happy because it wasn’t as good as it should have been,” Capello said. “The team decided to make some changes. What surprised me was after four or five laps, like in Houston, I found out I could keep up and catch the Porsche, we found we could push the car and it was very easy to drive. That’s what made the R8 so wonderful for the last six or seven years.”

Dumas and Bernhard, the pole-sitting duo, finished second overall and first in LMP2 for their second straight class win. The sister car of Sascha Maassen and Lucas Luhr, which pitted early to replace the front nose, finished second in class.

The Porsches never trailed in LMP2 and led overall for 68 laps.

“I caught an LMP2 car for what seemed to be 20 laps and followed him even with the blue flag so I lost all of my gap,” Dumas said about McNish’s pass. “Then Allan caught me and eventually got right around. The Aston got into me and I got caught breaking and he was breaking late. If you look at the Aston and the Corvette they have the power similar to us coming out of the slower corners, so the advantage went to the P1 where they had the torque to get back up. I am happy. Hats off to Dindo, Allan and the Audi team.”Audi, R8, ALMS, LMP1, oneighturbo

Ekström wins at Brands Hatch

Published July 2, 2006 in Audi, DTM, Racing and Watched. 0 Comments

In a gruelling 85 lap race in hot conditions, there was touring car racing at its best in the fourth round of the DTM at the Brands Hatch Indy circuit. Until lap 69, Danish pole-sitter Tom Kristensen looked all-set for his second consecutive victory, but then he retired with damaged suspension of his left front wheel at Clearways. Jamie Green inherited the lead, but the Brit’s joy wasn’t to last long as he ran wide at Brabham six laps later. This allowed Mattias Ekström to take first place and he went on to score the ninth victory of his DTM career, the 37th DTM win for Audi.

Start La Rosa stalls, Kristensen takes the from Green and Ekström, Frentzen, Schneider, Tomczyk, Häkkinen, Spengler, Abt, Stippler
Lap 2 Stippler off the track into the tyre barrier at Druids
Lap 6 The first three have pulled clear a little bit
Lap 6 The first three have pulled clear a little bit. Frentzen, Häkkinen into the pits. Häkkinen drives off with the tank can on his car. It falls out at the pit lane exit
Lap 10 Alesi into the pits
Lap 11 Kaffer and Mücke tangle while battling for ninth place
Lap 13 Kaffer into the pits
Lap 16 Stoddart into the pits
Lap 17 Schneider, Ickx into the pits
Lap 18 Spengler into the pits
Lap 20 Green, Tomczyk, Margaritis into the pits
Lap 22 La Rosa into the pits
Lap 23 Kristensen into the pits, Lauda briefly off the track
Lap 25 Lauda into the pits. Alesi and Frentzen tangle at Paddock
Lap 28 Ekström into the pits
Lap 31 Häkkinen into the pits
Lap 32 Schneider, Frentzen into the pits
Lap 35 Tomczyk, Abt, Green, Bleekemolen, Spengler into the pits
Lap 36 Scheider, Mücke, Kristensen into the pits
Lap 41 Kristensen has moved up into second place
Lap 42 Alesi into the pits
Lap 44 Vanina Ickx off the track going into Paddock Hill Bend
Lap 46 Margaritis, Bleekemolen into the pits
Lap 47 Kaffer into the pits
Lap 48 Lauda into the pits
Lap 52 Stoddart into the pits
Lap 60 Abt into the pits
Lap 61 Ekström into the pits
Lap 62 Scheider into the pits
Lap 65 Mücke into the pits. Drive through penalty for Mika Häkkinen for overtaking under yellow flag
Lap 69 Häkkinen into the pits
Lap 70 Kristensen slides off the track and enters the pits, retires. Damaged suspension left front wheel
Lap 73 Abt and Spengler collide in fight for 5th place. Alesi and Abt go pass Spengler
Lap 74 Green of the track, Ekström takes the lead
Lap 83 Frentzen into the pits, retires
Lap 85 Ekström wins in front of Green, Schneider, Tomczyk, Abt, Alesi, Spengler and Margaritis

Technorati Tags: Audi, DTM, Brands Hatch, oneighturbo

Kristensen secured second pole of the season

Published July 1, 2006 in Audi, DTM, Racing and Watched. 0 Comments

Kristensen secured second pole of the season
In an action-packed session, Tom Kristensen claimed the fourth pole-position of his DTM-career and the 31st pole for Audi with a lap time of 42.406 seconds. He will be lining up on the front row of the grid alongside British Mercedes-Benz-driver Jamie Green who was 0.248 seconds down. The final heat was interrupted after a severe crash by Heinz-Harald Frentzen who lost control of his Audi A4 DTM going into Paddock Hill Bend. At the same time, Mika Häkkinen hit the pitwall. Both cars were quite heavily damaged, but the drivers escaped unscathed.

The qualifying at a glance
12.37 h Qualifying starts, Bleekemolen is the first driver out on the track
12.38 h Fastest time for Bleekemolen 43.682, then Margaritis fastest with 43.395
12.40 h Christian Abt on top of the time sheets with 43.135, second fastest is Jean Alesi with 43.223
12.42 h Frentzen briefly off the track coming out of Paddock Hill Bend
12.43 h Frank Stippler is fastest with 43.107, Jamie Green then on top with 42.837
12.44 h Frank Stippler off the track at Paddock, but continues
12.49 h Green remains on top from Spengler, Kristensen, Tomczyk and Ekström
12.50 h End of the session. Green is fastest from Spengler, Kristensen and Tomczyk. Timo Scheider, Stefan Mücke, Jeroen Bleekemolen, Mathias Lauda, Susie Stoddart and Vanina Ickx fail to make the cut.
12.58 h Start of the next session, Pierre Kaffer is the first driver to go out on the track
13.00 h Jamie Green sets the fastest time of 42.674
13.03 h Jamie Green remains fastest from Bruno Spengler and Mika Häkkinen, Tom Kristensen is best-placed Audi-driver in fourth
13.06 h Frentzen off the track, continues
13.07 h Ekström improves from ninth to second with 42.706. Pierre Kaffer runs wide coming out of Paddock, but continues
13,08 h End of the session. Green is fastest from Ekström, Spengler, Häkkinen, Schneider, Kristensen, Tomczyk and Frentzen. Abt, Stippler, Kafer, Alesi, La Rosa and Margaritis don’t make it into the next session.
13.15 h Start of the final session, Ekström is the first driver to go out on the track.
13.17 h Massive crash by Heinz-Harald Frentzen going into Paddock Hill Bend. He escapes unscathed, the session is being stopped. Mika Häkkinen crashes into the pit wall at the main straight.
13.30 h Qualifying continues, five minutes to go. Tom Kristensen is the first driver to go out.
13.33 h Kristensen remains on top from Green, Frentzen, Spengler, Schneider, Ekström, Tomczyk and Häkkinen
13.34 h Ekström improves to fourth place
13.35 h End of the session, Kristensen is on pole from Green, Frentzen, Ekström, Spengler, Schneider, Tomczyk and Häkkinen.

Stippler fastest in final minute

Published July 1, 2006 in Audi, DTM, Racing and Watched. 0 Comments

Stippler fastest in final minute
The final minute of free practice of the DTM at Brands Hatch caused a huge surprise: Frank Stippler set the fastest time with the S line Audi A4 in 42.589 seconds. Driving a car from last year, the Rosberg driver was 0.280 seconds faster than Tom Kristensen, who had been fastest up to that point. Martin Tomczyk completed the Audi trio on top of the time sheets in third place.

Fastest Mercedes driver: Mika Häkkinen
Tom Kristensen and Mika Häkkinen had been dominating proceedings on top of the time screens for 59 minutes. At the end, the two times Formula 1 world champion from Finland was fastest Mercedes-Benz driver with his AMG-Mercedes C-Class in fourth place. Audi-drivers Mattias Ekström, Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Pierre Kaffer were followed by the second-fastest Mercedes-Benz-driver, local hero Jamie Green.

Fastest lady racer was Susie Stoddart in 16th place. With her AutoScout24 AMG Mercedes C-Class, she was also best-placed driver with 2004-machinery. Vanina Ickx was 19th with the Original Zubehör Audi A4 behind Jeroen Bleekemolen (Futurecom Audi A4) and Mathias Lauda (Junge Gebrauchte AMG Mercedes C-Class). Stefan Mücke, who only did seven laps, ended the free practice session in 20th place.