Sebring 12 Hours – Monday Round Up
New Cars Show Good Form

Two on track practice sessions on day 1 kicked off the 2008 American Le Mans Series at Sebring, under warm but breezy conditions.

The early session saw the #1 Audi heading the charts, while in the afternoon session, it was the Peugeot that took the top spot, with the best time of the day, a 1:43.302, set by Stephane Sarrazin, 1.6 seconds faster than pole was last year.

Sarrazin set a 1:42.801 at the test days six weeks ago. In the second session, it was the Peugeot and the #2 Audi the only cars into the 1:43 range. In the afternoon session, the #1 Audi only turned 6 laps.

The battle in LMP2 looks quite close between the Porsches and Acuras, with the #7 Penske heading the charts in both sessions, but just barely, over the Andretti Green entry. Both were in the 1:45 range, with the #16 Dyson Porsche also breaking into the same territory in the afternoon session. The single Penske that ran (#6 did not go out on track) as well as both Dyson entries and the three Acura entries were all bunched within a second of each other in the afternoon session.

The morning session saw damage to the Autocon Creation, which caused them to miss the afternoon session. An on track incident caused damage to the right rear, and the team is awaiting replacement parts from England. It may also cause them to miss the sessions on Tuesday.

It was Corvettes 1-2 as expected in GT1. The Bell Aston was able to turn 19 laps in the morning session, but did not see the track in the afternoon session. There was some concern (unconfirmed) about a possible crack in a frame rail.

GT2 saw the usual suspects, in fact the afternoon session saw a 1-2-3 finish of the leading cars in the points chase from last season, with a Risi-Lizard-Tafel order. The #62 Risi was in the 2:01s in both sessions, with #45 and 71 also breaking into the same range in the morning session. The fastest Risi time was over a second faster than the class qualifying record.

The Corsa Ferrari was able to run 19 laps in the morning session (best lap a 2:06), but did not make it out in the afternoon due to fuel pressure issues. The Farnbacher-Loles Porsche was also in the 2:06s – after only four laps. A sensor problem on the flywheel stopped running, but Marc Basseng was happy with the pace the car has shown in recent testing here, and a 2:03 showed promise of what’s to come.

Eric van de Poele may possibly have suffered heat stroke in the #61 Krohn-Risi Ferrari. He was taken to the medical center as a precaution.

As far as the new entries, all of the new GT2 cars made it out on track, with both the Robertson Ford GT and the Gigliotti Corvette making it, impressively, into the 2:06 range. The GT3 spec Barwell Aston was able to break into the 2:07s.

David Murry said that the Robertson team was “ecstatic” with the Ford GT.

“It has had very little problems. We were working on shock and spring settings, so we’re already working on setup. The goal for now is to find out what the car likes. We’ve made changes to the spring heights and ride heights. The car has no problems getting the power down. It really gives us the platform to be a winner.”

Everyone was thrilled with the Gigliotti Corvette too. Monday was regarded as a shakedown – and the C6 ran without a problem, not one. A 2:08 in the morning became a 2:06.167 in the afternoon.

“We really had a great day, today,” Marc Goossens said late in the afternoon. “After a lot of long hours and very little sleep in recent weeks for all the guys at Riley Technologies, we had the proof again that this company and their staff know how to build race cars. Not one little detail was overlooked and the car ran very well on its first outing. Of course we couldn’t compare lap times yet with the opposition but as soon as the second session we already improved our best lap time by no less than three seconds.

"There is obviously still a lot of work to do but everybody involved is extremely motivated and I’m sure we will be a lot stronger towards the end of the week. Hopefully my teammates and I can give the team a nice reward, by scoring a strong result, for the effort each one of them put into this project!”

The #5 VICI Porsche (with how it will look, above), ECO Radical, Barazi Epsilon Zytek and Autoracing Club Bratislava Porsche entries did not go out during the day.

The forecast calls for a 30% chance of rain overnight and for Tuesday (testing is in the afternoon). That's Jan Lammers having a fiddle with the Horag Porsche.