BRASELTON, Ga. — “When the going gets tough, the tough get going” is a well worn cliché, but an appropriate one to describe the 11th annual Petit Le Mans that took place Saturday at the twisting and hilly Road Atlanta circuit.
The 1,000-mile or 10-hour American Le Mans Series affair was filled with full course cautions and saw Audi and its turbocharged diesel R10 brigade continue its unbeaten streak in a comeback performance few thought possible at the beginning of the race.
Audi was facing its strongest challenge since Sebring in the form of Peugeot’s 908 turbo diesel, a car that since its debut in 2007 in the European-based Le Mans Series, has been quicker if less reliable than its German opposition.
Unlike the Sebring 12-Hour, which Peugeot used to dip its feet in the waters of the ALMS for the first time, and where the aged airport facility took its toll, leaving the French LMP1 coupe well behind at the finish, Peugeot was serious about humbling the Audi camp in North Georgia.
Having lost Le Mans and the 2008 Le Mans Series championship to Audi, Peugeot was determined to salvage something by winning at Road Atlanta. The seriousness of that attack was measured by the pole position the Nicolas Minassian, Stephane Sarazin, Christian Klien prototype achieved in qualifying. Unfortunately for the French manufacturer, they had to face Scotsman Allan McNish, co-driving with Emanuele Pirro and Rinaldo Capello in the Audisport North America R10.
Although, McNish didn’t grab the number one grid slot, he was starting on the outside of the front row, just a couple of hundredths of a second off the Peugeot’s clocking. At least, that was where he was supposed to start.
In reality, when the green flag came out shortly after 11 a.m., McNish’s Audi was still being remanufactured by its crew in the paddock after McNish had slammed it into a guardrail on his warm up lap, leaving it heavily damaged. Acknowledging he had made a mistake, McNish told the crew, “If you fix it, I will win with it.”
And that’s exactly what he did against all the odds.
Instead of fighting for the lead, the Scotsman found himself trying to catch up from a seemingly impossible two-lap deficit, staying in the car for a triple stint that would have left others exhausted. Playing the never-ending full-course yellows perfectly, McNish, Pirro and Capello got back their laps to join the Audi-Peugeot battle being fought by their R10 teammates, Marco Werner and Lucas Luhr, who kept exchanging the lead with Minassian, Sarrazin and Klien on an on-going basis throughout.
However, despite that appearance of parity, the French coupe was able to use its slight performance advantage to move into the lead almost at will, a trend which continued until the final stages, when McNish got back in the German spyder.
At that point, the Scotsman was a man on a mission, blowing by Werner and chasing down Klien as he used his softer compound Michelin tires to their best advantage. Within a period of minutes, he had caught and passed Klien and took over the lead for the final time despite challenges from his rival. McNish had kept his promise, as he crossed the finish just more than four seconds ahead of the Peugeot as Werner and Luhr, who had already clinched the LMP1 title honors, came home a close third.
More importantly, his efforts and those of Capello and Pirro gave Audi a clean sweep on the international endurance scene with Sebring, Le Mans and Petit Le Mans all going to the German car maker despite pre-season predictions that if there were sweeping to be done, it would be the Peugeot camp doing so.
Meanwhile, behind the Audis and the Peugeot, there was a Porsche parade in LMP2 as the Acura ARX-01b contingent had a horrible outing that began earlier in practice when the best-positioned Acura, the Patron Highcroft Racing example, was crashed by Scott Sharp in practice, forcing the crew to assemble a new car to put him, Dario Franchitti and David Brabham back in the action.
Unfortunately, the newly reconstituted Acura didn’t last long, its day ending when Sharp again crashed, this time due to an apparent mechanical issue.
Out front in a third Penske DHL Porsche RS Spyder were “guest” drivers Helio Castroneves and Ryan Briscoe, who were brought in following Acura’s charge to the front in manufacturer points at Detroit. Even though the pair exchanged the number one spot in LMP2 with the other two Penske RS Spyders, they generally held the advantage, taking fourth overall, with Timo Bernhard and Romain Dumas playing a more conservative game to come home fifth overall and second in LMP2. That was good enough to give them the driver’s championship for the second- straight season.
Third in LMP2 went to the Penske RS Spyder of Patrick Long and Sascha Maassen.
Unfortunately, the LMP2 results will remain unofficial until the protest of Highcroft’s principal, Duncan Dayton, concerning the fuel used by the Porsche is heard by officials of the International Motor Sports Ass’n later this month.
Meanwhile, in GT2 there was joy for Ferrari and Porsche, the Risi Ferrari 330GT entry of Mika Salo and Jaime Melo winning honors, with the Flying Lizard Porsche of Wolf Hinzler and Jorg Bergmeister crossing the line in second. That latter effort was more than enough to give the two Porsche men the drivers title as their main opposition, the Tafel Racing Ferrari of Dirk Mueller and Dominik Farnbacher, was able to do no better than third in class.
Also wrapping things up in GT1, where it has been a two-car Corvette team contest, were Johnny O’Connell and Jan Magnussen, who took the championship with the help of Ron Fellows over Olivier Beretta and Oliver Gavin, who had Max Papis in their cockpit. They again wound up second in the race and second in the standings.