BRASELTON, Ga. — “As long as we are a part of Le Mans, and we intend to remain a part, we will respect Le Mans and its rules.”
Scott Atherton, the head of the Panoz Motorsports Group and its American Le Mans Series, is clear about the fact that the future of the ALMS lies with Le Mans and the L’Automobile Club du L’Ouest from which it leases its technical regulations.
On the eve of the 10th anniversary of Road Atlanta’s Petit Le Mans 1,000-mile round of the championship Saturday, Atherton was upbeat about the series and its future.
“I think the fact that attendance is up this year clearly demonstrates that we have a product that people want to see,” Atherton said. “Moreover, we’ve ventured into some new areas such as aligning ourselves through the use of alternative fuels like Ethanol that put us at the forefront of the race to help improve our environment which is a win-win situation for all of us.”
In a year when many wondered if the ALMS could prosper with the continued domination of the ALMS’s premier LMP sports racing division by the turbocharged diesel Audi R10s, who in 2006 simply outclassed everything else on the track, the Don Panoz-owned tour has not only prospered, it has provided some of the best competition seen in North American road racing in recent memory.
Much of that has come about because of “rules adjustments,” allowed by the ACO under its lease agreement with the ALMS, that have allowed the LMP2 category Porsche RS Spyders and their Acura counterparts to be competitive with the Audis.
Indeed, as the Penske team Porsches arrive at Road Atlanta, they will be putting an eight-race overall win streak on the line. The question is not whether or not, given the investment made by parent company Honda and Porsche in their respective LMP2 programs, that the LMP2 cars will remain as competitive in 2008 in light of the extra 50 kilograms of weight the ACO has mandated for them next year.
Again, Atherton was clear. “As far as we’re concerned, the LMP1 division is the most important one for us. What we want to have is a situation where the LMP2 cars are ‘nipping at the heels’ of their LMP1 opposition with the very real possibility that given the right track and the right circumstances they can win outright. Right now our rules, which include the smaller air restrictors for LMP2, mirror those of the ACO across the board for all four of our classes. We intend to continue in that vain.”
Even so, Atherton is quite aware of the fact that the needs of the ALMS with its multi-race schedule, and those of Le Mans which is built around its single 24-hour endurance classic, are different. When asked about how and when the ALMS would implement the new eight scriptures, which most experts think will make the LMP2 prototypes uncompetitive with the LMP1 entries, Atherton replied: “We will do this very carefully. We can run very sophisticated simulations to find out exactly what impact the rules will have.”
One area that the ALMS has struggled with is the size of its fields, which have remained relatively small, and which Atherton in the past has vowed to increase. “I’m not going to make any predictions,” he said. “However, with the exception of GT1, I think we’ve made progress, particularly in GT2 and LMP2.”