Paul Ricard Test Days – The Press Conference
Changes For 2008

Patrick Peter had plenty of positive comments to make at the Le Mans Series press conference on Monday lunchtime at the HTTT – and the appropriate opening remarks concerned the number of new cars on display at the HTTT.

He referred to “the return of Audi”, with a two car programme for the first time since the maiden year of the LMS, when the cars were a ‘semi-factory’ team running in Veloqx colours. Audi against Peugeot is going to liven up the front of the field more than somewhat.

New LMP1 and LMP2 Lolas, the first appearance of the Porsche RS Spyders, the Aston Martin Vantage GT2, the Epsilon-Euskadi – there’s plenty of exciting new machinery around this year.

“For four years we have improved the sporting quality and we have improved the quality of the teams,” continued Patrick Peter (with an English translation coming through headphones, so perhaps the words we heard weren’t his exact choice). “It is time to turn the series into a media success and a popular success.”

He promised a media guide for the first time this season, and also the presence of five or six staff from Infos-course, to gather and disseminate all the information relating to pit stops, track incidents etc. He also promised to make the series website “more lively and more interactive”.

“We will be making special efforts for the promotion of the events (this year).. and we have worked with all the circuits over the winter.” The five race meetings will be advertised this year, “at considerable expense”, and the series will be “presenting activities in the paddock for the spectators.. which will ramp up during the year”.

Cynics might suggest that it’s only the return of Audi that has instigated the emphasis on the promotion of the races, which has always been a weakness of the series – until now.

Covering the start of the races on Eurosport, and then bringing Eurosport viewers some of the rest of the action live too, will certainly reach out to a wider audience than Motors managed – but the regular LMS channel will still cover the whole of each event live, so viewers will have a choice. The ‘full-on, SPEED-type’ coverage of ALMS events is asking too much (of a continent with so many different languages), but the prospect of ‘radio web’ coverage (not mentioned during the press conference) should do much to fill in many of the blanks in listeners’ (viewers’) understanding of the way each race unfolds.

NB. The provisional plan comprises the first 30 minutes of each race broadcast live, a highlights summary on the evening of the meeting, and on the following Tuesday, then a one hour summary during the week following the event.

The ACO’s Daniel Poissenot, together with Michelin’s representative, introduced an invigorated Michelin Energy Endurance Challenge for a second year, and based on the five LMS races plus Le Mans, ‘Michelin will reward those teams which succeed in combining performance and energy consumption the most efficiently at these six races’.

An Energy Efficiency Index will be calculated for every classified car after each event, and the ACO, and Michelin have revised the way the index is calculated, in order to make it easier to understand.

The Energy Efficiency Index will be the ratio between the car's average speed and its average fuel consumption over the course of the race. So 130kph average and 10 litres per 100km = an index of 13. No distinction will be made between the different categories. The results of the Michelin Energy Endurance Challenge will be published on the evening of each race and prizes will be awarded to the winning teams at the following meeting.

"This new, simple calculation will single out the most fuel-efficient cars taking into account their performance on the track,” says Matthieu Bonardel, the manager of Michelin Competition's four-wheel programme.

Fuel consumption will be converted into Joules/km to take into account the different fuel types used.

Michelin’s representative referred to the “development tyres” that the company will supply in LMP1, LMP2 and GT1, while for GT2, Michelin will only supply “commercial tyres” – or customer tyres. Development tyres are also referred to as “confidential tyres” by the French manufacturer, we believe.

Back to the Le Mans Series itself, and Patrick Peter admitted that the 2008 calendar “is not perfect”, but the organisers are “working on the 2009 calendar already. We want to publish the (2009) calendar much earlier.” This year’s was only clarified once the ACO announced its Shanghai race.

“We can claim to have the five most beautiful circuits (in Europe),” said Patrick Peter. “Barcelona is much more suitable than Valencia.” The Spanish venue early last season wasn’t popular with the teams, but at least they (we) haven’t got to return there for a second time – which also applies to Interlagos.

It will be interesting to see how the changes for 2008 affect the events, starting at Barcelona early next month.