Portimão by Night
The Le Mans 24 Hours are six weeks behind us and that means it is time for the third round of the 2009 Le Mans Series. All the teams will face a new challenge as the series will be racing at the Autódromo Internacional Algarve for the first time ever, in fact it is the first ever visit to Portugal. The race at Portimão will have another unique character; it will be a night race!
Thirty-five cars will be racing on the track that was constructed only last year. The ‘1000Km do Algarve’ will start at 7.15pm and be run over 215 laps, but will finish no later than 1.15am. Even though the temperature won’t be a high at night as it is during the day it is still expected to have some influence on the race proceedings.
Ten LMP1 cars will be out on track this weekend. Earlies this season Team Peugeot Total was expected to join the Portuguese round, but the French manufacturer decided not to travel South. Pescarolo Sport leads the championship after two second place finishes at Barcelona and Spa, where it was beaten by the Peugeot 908 HDi FAP. At Portimão the Pescarolo Sport team will only enter the #16 Pescarolo 01, Henri Pescarolo being forced to drop his second car due to a lack of budget. The Boullion-Tinseau car is a top entry though and should be able to finally make that move onto the top step of the podium.
Jan Charouz, Tomas Enge and Stefan Mücke will certainly do whatever they can to prevent a Pescarolo win. The Aston Martin Racing drivers are currently second in the team overall classification. Having won the race in Barcelona the three drivers hope to put their #007 Aston Martin Racing Lola Aston on top of the podium again and by doing that winning both rounds on the Iberian Peninsula. The Portuguese fans could be cheering for Miguel Ramos, who returns to the #009 entry. Primat, Turner and Ramos can only hope luck will turn around at Portimão after a disappointing start of the season.
More cheers are expected for the Team Oreca Matmut AIM team. The #10 Oreca 01 AIM will see Bruno Senna joined by Portuguese ace Tiago Monteiro. With the #10 currently fourth in the overall standings the Oreca squad hopes to score some valuable points after a DNF at Spa and Le Mans. The team’s second car will again be raced by Panis and Lapierre, who hope to bounce back in the LMS after a great result at Le Mans where they finished fifth overall.
The other cars are less likely to battle for the podium spots, although the Signature Plus Courage-Oreca of Ragues and Mailleux was close in Barcelona. Kolles will again be entering its two Audi R10 TDIs with the same lineup as the team ran at Le Mans, including Narain Karthikeyan. Strakka Racing, without Peter Hardman as of this race, and Speedy Racing Team Sebah are the final two cars in the LMP1 class, the former possibly be the dark horse again?
In the LMP2 category twelve cars will take to the track this weekend. So far it has been an open season with no full season team yet clearly on top. Racing Box (#30), Quifel ASM Team and Speedy Racing Team Sebah all have ten points going into this round. All of them have had one top result and one poor(er). Miguel Amaral’s Quifel ASM Team is racing on home soil, so they will be extra motivated to win this one. Biagi, Bobbi and Piccini will also be doing their best to forget the Spa-Francorchamps round where an early exit meant the #30 Racing Box was unable to extend its championship lead. The Italian team hopes for a better result at Portimão and should be one of the favourites to win. But in the #33 Speedy Lola Kane, Pompidou and Leuenberger have exactly the same goal.
OAK Racing’s Ajlani and Lahaye will be going after their first podium finish of the year, while the second Racing Box car (Ceccato, Francioni and Piccini) will also be looking for a podium finish at least.
The other teams in LMP2 are unlikely to challenge for the podium places. The #24 OAK Racing Pescarolo hopes to start this race rather than retiring on the warm-up lap. RML has had problems with their Mazda engine at every race and their first finish of 2009 would be a big achievement. If no finish, expect changes there. Ibanez Racing Service has repaired their car after the Spa accident. At WR / Salini Tristan Gommendy has been replaced by another quick French driver, none other than Bruce Jouanny. G.A.C. Racing Team, Bruichladdich Bruneau will likely be ‘also rans’. For the occiasion Q8 Oils Hache Team brought in two new names to its squad, Grand Prix and Superbike racer Fonsi Nieto and his girlfriend, Europen F3 Open driver Carmen Jordá.
GT1 will be a French affair. Reiter Engineering has withdrawn its Lamborghini Murcielago but Larbre Competition will return with their Saleen S7R for Berville, Dumez and Lémeret. They will be fighting the GT1 championship leader Luc Alphand Aventures. The French team missed last weekend’s Total 24 Hours of Spa but is back in action in Portugal with one C6.R entered for Jullien Jousse, Patrice Goueslard and Yann Clairay.
Eleven GT2 cars will form the final group of cars at the Portimão circuit. The entire top ten of the championship will be in action in Portugal. Virgo Motorsport, the eleventh team to have scored points this year will not be there.
Team Felbermayr Proton is coming to Portugal as GT2 class leader. With its Spa win reinstated the team’s #77 Porsche 997 GT3 RSR is six points ahead of its nearest rival. Works drivers Lieb and Lietz will again be joined by Felbermayr Sr. Lietz has raced here before and even took a win in a Porsche. Lieb is completely new, but this should not be a problem. The sister car #88 will have its regular crew again, with Cruz Martins driving a home race.
Chasing the #77 Porsche are no less than four Ferrari F430 GT2s with top line ups. JMW Motorsport will be bringing its quality line up of Bell and Bruni again. At Team Modena Jaime Melo will once more support Garcia and Mansell while Pierre Ehret, Dominik Farnbacher, Anthony Beltoise, Pierre Kaffer and Allan Simonsen will be racing the two Farnbacher entries.
Behind the Porsche and the four Ferrari’s in the GT2 standings are two cars that are just waiting to take a podium finish at Portimão. Snoras Spyker Squadron showed its capabilities at Le Mans where it took the finish ahead of all the Porsches. Coronel and Janis are more than willing to do even better here in this night race. Meanwhile IMSA Matmut Performance hopes to get rid of the bad luck it had so far. Pilet and Narac have been in a Porsche almost every weekend it seems with races in the GT Open, the Le Mans Series as well as the 24 Hours of Le Mans and Spa.
Drayson Racing’s Vantage could be up for something at Portimão as the team already visitedt the circuit earlier this year for pre-Le Mans testing. The data collected at that test could well mean an advantage over several teams.
JMB Racing and Easyrace complete the GT2 field, with Portuguese driver Cesar Campanico the latest addition to the field as he will be racing the JMB Racing Ferrari alongside John Hartshorne.
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