LMS Test Paul Ricard - Sunday Afternoon Notes

There was a slight ‘lost in translation’ moment with Hugues de Chaunac earlier – Stephane Ortelli and Soheil Ayari are here testing in the #10 car together with Bruno Senna.

The Easyrace Ferrari is the sole Pirelli runner here (aside from the second ARC Bratislava Saleen which is not intending to race on the Italian rubber)

The Team Essex Porsche apparently does not have the (more powerful and expensive) direct injection engine fitted.

Mark Lieb, at Felbermayr Proton, is a happy chappy on several levels at the moment, the team’s expectation is that the 2009 spec Porsche will be closer still to the ultimate GT2 pace this season.  The team will be running development Michelin rubber too – this a bone of contention throughout the 2008 season with the Porsche on customer Michelins battling the Virgo Ferrari on development Dunlops. In addition Marc’s studies are finally complete, the Porsche factory man scoring an excellent 1.6 in his degree (scored form 1-4 with 1 being the highest possible).

The aero changes required for the 2009 spec GT2s has had a dramatic effect on the straightline speed attainable here with the addition of a rear Gurney flap in particular wiping off a chunk of speed – Interestingly though whilst Lieb reported that their top speed was down by c.8 kmph, one of the principal Ferrari players equated their loss as c.15 kmph!

“It does feel rather like you are driving a Cup car on the main straight here but you are quicker in the medium speed and fast corners because there is more downforce.”

Luc Alphand was another happy man this afternoon, the Corvette running strongly and the team rapidly pulling together their 2009 plans.

The major news from this team is that Dunlop rubber is confirmed for their single car LMS entry (and looking very likely for FIA GTs too!)

The LMS drivers are also confirmed as Luc Alphand, Yann Clairay and Patrice Goueslard, this trio, plus the FIA GT squad of Guillaume Morea and Xavier Maassen will also form five sixths of the team’s Le mans 24 Hours entry with one car looking set to be designated for the ‘youngsters’ Moreau, Clairay and Maassen.  A sixth driver has yet to be confirmed.

The Quifel ASM team were going through a planned engine change ahead of their night session run this evening.  Alan Mugglestone was sitting in the team office looking happy enough. “The Zytek starts when you push the green button and stops when you press the red one and is giving us no real problems at all.  We’re at step 2 of a 10 step development programme and right on plan.”

So how will the change to just two tyre changers affect strategy?

“It will be a pretty major change.  Last year we were double stinting drivers but with the time we would lose in the pits you are pushed towards triple stints immediately..”

Guy Smith then interjected:

“I know this car is very light on its tyres.  The balance to be drawn always, but particularly now, is to get the most out of the tyres in performance terms but always making them last. I can’t wait to try the car, it’ll be my first time in a Zytek, one of the few I haven’t tried.”

Olivier Pla later told dsc that there had been another perhaps unexpected result of the reshuffled aero changes in LMP and GT classes:  “We can’t pass the GT2 cars on the straight now!” There will therefore no doubt be much late braking action in the racing to come this season.

At Oak Racing the team were bustling around the Pescarolo Mazda, new team name, new engine and a very new look.

Jacques Nicolet:

“I am very pleased with the 2009 programme.  This is the first year of a 2 year deal with Mazda and we hope to extend that further based on results this season.”

The team only has a single car here at Paul Ricard, this the chassis which ran last year in LMP2 with Judd power.  The second car is still at Pescarolo’s factory with the final stages of a rebuild from it’s LMP1 spec last year to LMP2 spec very near to completion.

“We wanted a deal with a factory and of course it makes sense in that regard to have a two car team with the same chassis and engine.  We have also changed to Dunlop of course and that too is a deal that we are very happy with indeed.  In the short time I have had in the car so far it is clear that it is well matched with our new tyres.

“We have a big development plan ahead of us and the second car will join in with that plan in a week or so.  We have been working hard on new bodywork for 2009.  Barcelona will see us running with a hybrid of 2008 and 2009 parts but at Spa we will have the full 2009 cars.”

So who came up with the new look for the team?

At this point Sylvie Nicolet (wife of le Patron) interjected “it was developed by Lionel Schwenke at Keystone.  We are very pleased with it.”  So you should be Madame it looks splendid – good taste and modest too – The initial concept for the new look was defined by Sylvie Nicolet herself.

At around 16:30, just after setting fastest time of the day to that point (1:42.575) the #007 Lola Aston Martin, Tomas Enge at the wheel, went straight on at the very fast right hander Turn 11b - Beausset - taken in fourth gear, the car went across the long and extensive outfield, heavy braking evident, but struck the Armco barrier very heavily - badly damaging the front, and particularly front left, of the car.  Enge was reported as having struck the steering wheel in the impact but after a brief trip to the Medical centre was well enough to be back in civvies and back at the garage where he told dsc “I made a mistake, nothing broke.”  Always honest, Tomas could only look on as the front end of the car was blanketed over, it looks like #007’s weekend is done.

Young Brecht Decancq from www.planetlemans.com was on the scene - take a look here to see just how big a hit this was. 

Stephane Daoudi was not the happiest of chappies in the JMB garage, but not because of anything to do with the #99 Ferrari; "To be honest, there's a lot that's not okay at the moment," he began. "I'm here on the Aucott Racing side, and it was looking as though I'd be doing a similar programme to last year, with a mixture of LMS and FIA races. But then yesterday Ben cancelled his racing programme for the year for personal reasons and I'm not sure what's going to happen now.

"Today, I'm mainly doing driver coaching for the two new drivers (Nicolas Misslin and Jesper Laursen), but I don't know them at all. I've only done four laps so far."

Jonny Cocker took the Drayson Racing Vantage back out on track mid-way through the afternoon session, after a lengthier than planned stop to fit new cooling ducts.

At just before 17:15, the #11 Oreca LC70 AIM set a 1:41.771 - beating Creation's 2008 best non-diesel time, and then knocked a further three tenths off on the next lap to lower the target time to 1:41.442.

It was a similar story in GT2, with first Marc Lieb in the Felbermayr Porsche closing to within a tenth of the 2008 best, and then the Hankook-shod Farnbacher Ferrari beating it by half a second; 1:57.883.

LMP2 and GT1 times were still someway off the 2008 best.