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Sebring 12 Hours –
GT Qualifying This was a very, very good GT1 and 2 qualifying session – so a real shame that the times didn’t count. It was up to DSC to explain to a number of teams that the IMSA rule states that times from both sessions are discounted if one of them runs for less than 10 minutes. It’s a relief to have copied the times from the screen and so be able to document who actually did what. Melo, Farnbacher and Simonsen did it at the start of the session, so we had a Ferrari 1-2-3, but not for long. Would the Porsches be truly competitive, in the first real test of 997 vs. 430 pace? Yes, it looked as though they would, Bergmeister going fastest with #45 Lizard 997, a 2:01.3. Dirk Werner then went second for Farnbacher-Loles, a 2:01.6. Greg Loles had said, just before the session, that he would be disappointed not to be in the top five. His car was P2… but not for long. Jaime Melo set a 2:00.945 for Risi, and that was the GT2 pole – but we still had plenty of changes to come behind. Richard Lietz grabbed second for #46 Lizard Porsche, a 2:01.241, while the F-Loles Posche went even faster, Dirk Werner third on the grid (we thought), a 2:01.310. Bergmeister’s time was eight thousandths slower – so Porsches 2-3-4.. who would have guessed that? The Tafel Ferraris were fifth and sixth, Farnbacher from Simonsen – so three of each in the top six. Advantage Porsche on points? Well… the Lizards’ feeling seemed to be that it’s still early days with their three 997s, and they’re still exploring their capabilities – and race pace is more important anyway, while Tony Dowe revealed that “Dominik Farnbacher made a slight mistake on his best lap, at the last corner” so perhaps Tafel #71 might have split the 997s, or made it a Ferrari front row. As far as the 2008 spec Porsche, Johannes van Overbeek said, “we’re still not where we want to be, as we really don’t yet have much time with the car. Actually, from what I can tell, it’s somewhat like the situation we were in last year with the then new 997. Nothing that we knew from the 996 applied to setting up the 997. Now, nothing that we learned from the old 997 really applies to our new 997. We’re still learning our way. We are making progress and it appears that this new car will allow further development than we were able to get with the old spec car. Yes, the car is better, and we think we can compete with the Ferrari, at least what we’ve seen of the Ferrari. But they too have a new car.” ‘Pole man’ Jaime Melo (the car would be fastest even after the jiggling around): “It was a very good qualifying but actually my best lap could have been a little bit better. I had a big oversteer in the last corner and lost a couple of tenths of a second, maybe, but I’m happy with the car and I think we are in good shape for the race. We did a good job over the winter and we also made quite a lot of changes during this week, but today the car was okay. The tires that Michelin give us are very consistent, especially with our car, and that’s very good for the race.” Farnbacher-Loles’ Dirk Werner, third fastest: "I think we showed what we are capable of and we showed that the Porsche has made a big step compared to 2007. It's very close in the qualifying and I think it will be close racing. I'm really looking forward to racing with all these good drivers – the factory [Porsche] drivers and the Ferrari drivers. Thanks to the team, the car was really great. They did a great job in developing the car to that point in only a few days." Darren Law was a little way (seven tenths) behind Tafel’s #73, then it was Joey Hand in the Panoz, then the Kumho-shod Corvette and Vici Porsche. Chris Hall in the Viper was just ahead of Jonny Cocker in the Aston Martin, and the Krohn Ferrari and Bratislava Porsche brought up the tale. Much later we realised the times wouldn’t count, so we’ll tell a few GT stories to conclude an unusual qualifying report. Oh, the Robertson Ford GT missed qualifying as an engine was being changed. Good timing. Oh, GT1 was Magnussen from Gavin, the Bell DBR9 almost four seconds off the pace, for reasons we can explain, thanks to Team Modena’s Rik Bryan, here helping out the team new to Aston Martin racing. “The car will come up to full Aston Martin spec. in due course,” explained Rik Bryan – with the latest engine spec., air con, which will mean a larger restrictor size and improved aero. It is a 2006 car, so there are updates to come.” The Bell Motorsports’ problem this week has been a lack of track time, owing to “a crack on the f/right upper suspension mounting. It’s a cast part that fits into the chassis leg, and the team has no idea why it cracked, but they were obviously unhappy about running like that, so had to wait for parts to be flown out from Prodrive. They just missed getting out at the end of yesterday afternoon’s session. “So the team was using qualifying, the full 25 minutes for more set-up work, and they’re still looking for the right set-up for the Dunlops.” Doug Fehan added a little more to the explanation of the fuel cell issue that prompted Corvette Racing to switch back to E10, for now. What component of the E85 was causing the problem with the fuel cell? “It wasn’t any one component. The fuel cells are suitable for any one of gasoline, methanol or ethanol, but it was the blend of the E85 that caused the problem with the glue in the fuel cell.” That’s an appropriate point to find out how the Drayson-Barwell team is getting on – because they are using E85, but then they do have a year’s experience, from British GTs last year. Mark Lemmer tells a fascinating tale – the first four days of ALMS racing for the Drayson-Barwell team. “We run an identical specification, ATL fuel cell, to the Corvettes, but it appears that IMSA is experimenting with the energy content of the E85 fuel. If there is more energy, we need less fuel, and that makes the car easier to balance. But playing around with the additives meant a fuel cell problem, and Corvette racing played safe – but we decided to stick with the E85. With IMSA, we discussed a blend without certain additives to boost the energy content: we wanted something to match the UK spec. we used last year – and we agreed on a blend of cellulosic ethanol and race fuel, similar to the Carless fuel we used last year. “But by then it was too late to dyno. our engine before leaving for Florida: we were confident it would be OK, but still a bit nervous. “The new blend of fuel was coming from somewhere in central / north America, and it would have arrived here in plenty of time – except that a severe storm hit much of the northern states, and the truck was delayed. Eventually it was due to arrive on Monday morning, but we didn’t want to lose any track time. Just over an hour before the track opened, we made the decision to go back to E10 to start the week. I called Aston Martin Racing, they emailed me a map for the E10, we fired it in, and we started the first session bang on time! “When the E85 arrived, we put that map back in, and we’re really pleased with the way the car runs on it. The only problem we’ve had has been with the starter, probably because the engine needed quite a lot of cranking on the E10. We changed it after Monday. “Paul (Drayson) has been going really well here. On race pace, Jonny and Tim are running 2:06s, while Paul is doing 2:08s, which is really pleasing.” Jonny Cocker was slightly slower in qualifying than his 2:04.9 this (Thursday) morning – but as it turned out, his morning time counted for the grid. The whole team is very pleased with the Dunlops, and “they’re right behind the Vantage project,” finishes off Mark Lemmer. We’re half expecting that another GT2 team will shortly announce Dunlop as its tyre supplier. Last word on GT ‘qualifying’ – and it’s that Corvette, on its Kumhos. Marc Goossens: “The changes we made for qualifying did work – although the C6 was a tiny bit slower, it is more consistent. Now we are going to make it better.” Serge Saulnier at Peugeot Sport has referred to the cancellation of qualifying times as “an uncustomary regulation” – which seems to sum up the day, really. None of it will matter by late on Saturday evening. Audi’s ALMS plans will become apparent tomorrow. Two cars, for all the remaining 10 races? With drivers being juggled to fit around other programmes? We’ll see. And that was (non) qualifying. Oh, night practice has just
finished - and was pretty uneventful. The Peugeot was fastest - with all three
diesels in the 1:45s. Below is the diesel that won't get out until Utah.
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