ALMS, Sebring Winter Test - Monday Afternoon Report
Of Tyres And Cheese

In the midst of all of the testing, we had a couple of announcements. At the media luncheon, sponsored by Michelin, it was announced that the series and Michelin will continue with the Green X Challenge for the upcoming season. Also announced was that the American Le Mans Series now has an official Cheese. Yes, an official Cheese. Yancey’s Fancy cheese is now the official cheese of the series.

Scott Atherton stated that as of the moment, 36-37 cars are expected for the Sebring race. He expects the grid for the series to average 30 or greater for the season, with the likelihood that others will join in at a later time.

In the morning session, it was Aston Martin heading the time sheets, but Jon Field was only a quarter of a second back in his Intersport Lola. Intersport are running two cars this year, with Jon and Clint in the P1 Lola and Brian Wong and Mitch Pagerey in their LMPC car. At first glance, the cars are difficult to tell apart, as they are painted the same, in a typical Intersport livery.

For Wong and Pagerey, the prototype experience is a new one, one which they are adapting to. Wong, who is also racing in a junior NASCAR series is learning to adapt to the totally different handling characteristics of the prototype, while Pagerey is adapting over from GT cars.

Highcroft is back to their P2 chassis, running a development of the HPD 3.4 liter V8 that was used last season n the P1 car. David Brabham – "We’re still getting re-acclimated to the car. It’s going well so far. We’re running it as we expect to be able to run it in the race, but we’re still awaiting the final regulations. If they change much between now and then, it’ll be a real inconvenience to us. We just don’t have much time between now and the race to make changes.” Brabs did confirm that his dad, Sir Jack will be traveling to the first F1 race of the season, where they will have a celebration, honoring the still-living world champions. “I’d like to be there, but it just doesn’t work with my schedule. It’ll be good for my dad though.”

Last seasons P1 car was good, but it never had the chance to be fully developed, according to David. “ It didn’t have a chance to really become what it could have been. We never had tires developed to match the characteristics of the car and as a result, we never got to see it’s potential. That said, I don’t think the P1 car would have been able to stick with the diesels. Just not enough in traffic. The P2 is still a good car and I think we’ll do well. We’re just about there with the P1 cars down the straights. I guess it depends on how the regs turn out.”

Chris Dyson reported that things are going well so far. “There was further development of the Mazda motor during the off season, focusing on reliability and of course we’re on Dunlop tires this season.” There are some who think the move to Dunlops is a shrewd move by the team, as in Europe at least, the Dunlop tires appeared to be on par or maybe even slightly better than the Michelin tires over there. As far as a second car, Chris stated, “we’re still working towards that goal. We’re exploring some new avenues and hope to have our second car on track soon. For Sebring, we’re concentrating on a single entry, but afterwards I hope we can bring the program on board.” A transmission issue ended the afternoon session early for the team.

Andy Wallace really enjoyed his time in the Genoa LMPC, setting the fastest time in the morning session for the class. “The car is quite good. A proper race car. It’s responding well to the changes that we make and it’s quite a blast to drive. I’m not sure if I’ll be back in it or not. I’m just doing what I’m told to do.”

Jaime Melo was in the Ferrari which set the pace in the GT(2) category. Obviously with setting the fastest time things are going well, but according to the team, the fast time was set with a very low fuel setting. The team was system testing, making sure that the fuel systems were operating as intended and even ran out of fuel on track, causing a red flag during the session. Melo – “It’s going to be a busy year, with racing here and in the LMS, plus testing at Ferrari. We’ve reached the end of development on the 430, so testing over there has pretty much been wrapped up, but soon I expect to start working on the new car.”

In a bit of sad news, it was reported that David Sims did not travel with the team for the test, due to medial reasons. Get well soon “Beaky”!!

So far, Bryan Sellers is taking a back seat to his new teammate, Wolf Henzler, as the Falken team come to grips with their new Porsche. “Wolf is doing the set up right now. We’ve got a bit of a balance problem right now, so we’ve still got some work to do. Wolf has so much experience with these Porsches – it’s great to have him with us. Once we get the balance issues settled, we hope to start getting in some tire testing. We’ve got a ways to go, but we’ll keep working at it.”

Anthony Lazzaro reported that the Black Swan Porsche is the ex-Farnbacher-Loles car from last year. “Tim (Pappas) simply put the black vinyl over the car for the test. I’m not sure what the plans are for the season as far as colors go, but I kind of like it as it is.”  

GH