Le Mans Series

Teams from East, Teams from West: A full starting grid for the 1,000 km of Monza

Competitors for the second round of the Le Mans Endurance Series, to take place at Monza on July 10, will come from every part of the globe. Binnie Motorsports, from America, will start its LMES season on the Milanese circuit. The Convers Bank Ferrari 550 team which finished second in GT1 in the opening round, at Spa, is sponsored by a Russian bank and has two Russian drivers. The Japan Lamborghini Owners Club will run two Murcielagos in the GT1 category.

A brand new Porsche from the GruppeM team will be raced by three drivers from the People’s Republic of China, and three Thai drivers will compete for another British team, Tech 9 Motorsport. This is a fully international grid, on which European based teams will feel confident of taking the outright victory.

Actually, a full grid of 50 cars will take part in the second round of the 2005 Le Mans Endurance Series at Monza, Italy on July 15, and there are three more on the reserve list making this the strongest entry yet seen. The Series, which is backed by the Automobile Club de l’Ouest and is run to Le Mans regulations, has been growing in strength since its inception in 2004, and has now fully “come of age? with a magnificent entry of 22 prototypes and 28 GT cars, a mixture of GT1 and GT2.

“We never doubted that the Le Mans formula, featuring both prototypes and GT cars on the same grid, would succeed,” says organiser Patrick Peter. “Even so, economic conditions generally remain a little difficult, so we are delighted that the Le Mans Endurance Series has reached maturity after just one season. We will offer the public in Italy an excellent motor race, and later at Silverstone, at the Nürburgring, and in Turkey.”

In “LM”P1″, the 1,000-kilometre contest will be between Spa winners Zytek Motorsport, and a similar Zytek of Team Jota, the Creation Autosportif DBA, Pescarolo Sport, Courage Competition, Audi Playstation Team Oreca, Rollcentre Racing, Lister Racing and GP racing, a fascinating array of cars with V8, V10 and V12 engines. The Audi is now the only one powered by a turbocharged engine.

Audi Playstation Team Oreca heads the entry list with the Audi R8 for Stephane Ortelli and Jean-Marc Gounon. The German car is handicapped by ACO rules this season because it does not conform to the latest construction regulations and is not a favourite to win the Italian race. However, good strategy and proven reliability could tip the scales in favour of the Audi.

Judd V10 engines power both the Courage Competition C60-H to be driven by Jonathan Cochet, Alexander Frei and Christian Vann, and the Pescarolo Sport C60 Hybrid entered for Emmanuel Collard and Jean-Christophe Boullion. Yves Courage’s car was eliminated from the opening round at Spa by an incident in the pit-lane, so the Le Mans constructor will be anxious to score maximum points at Monza.

Zytek Motorsport’s nimble LMP1 had a textbook run to victory at Spa in April and drivers John Nielsen, Casper Elgaard and Hayanari Shimoda will aim to repeat the exercise at Monza. Team Jota from England has a similar Zytek 04S for Sam Hignett, John Stack and Haruki Kurosawa, while Creation Autosportif enters the Judd-powered DBA 03S for Nicolas Minassian and Jamie Campbell-Walter.

Martin Short’s Rollcentre Racing Dallara Judd, with João Barbosa co-driving, earned a podium finish at Spa and the Italian chassis will be even more at home at Monza. Lister Racing has entered its Chevrolet powered Storm LMP, and GP Racing makes a welcome return with the Promec, now with a Judd engine, for Alex Caffi and Michele Serafini.

The “LM”P2 category has been boosted by a new entry from Swiss Fredy Lienhard, who will make his LMES debut with a Lola B05/40 Judd which he will share with Didier Theys. Paul Belmondo has entered two Courage C65 Fords in the LMP2 category and two Chrysler Vipers in GT1. No fewer than six of the 13 entries in LMP2 have been manufactured by Yves Courage at Le Mans. Numerically Lola is the next strongest make with four entries, including RML’s MG-Lola, which will be raced by Mike Newton and Tommy Erdos.
¤Bill Binnie and Bobby Julien cross the Atlantic to race their Lola B05/40 Nicholson McLaren.

The “LM”GT category seems to be “Oriental” competitors’ favourite Japan Lamborghini Owners Club enters two Murcielago R-GTs for an international team, including Japanese drivers Koji Yamanishi &Hisashi Wada, Dutch Peter Kox, German Norman Simon and Italian Marco Apicella.

In LM”GT1, BMS Scuderia Italia, the reigning FIA GT Champions, have entered a pair of Ferrari 550 Maranellos, as did the Convers team from Russia, and Menx Racing from the Czech Republic, but only one each. Two Saleen S7Rs prepared by Graham Nash challenge the Ferraris and Belmondo Chryslers, and JMB Racing will run their Ferrari 575.

In LM”GT2, no fewer than 15 cars are listed in this category, nine of them Porsche GT3s challenged by three TVR Tuscans and three Ferrari 360s. Sebah Automotive defends its GT2 title with its Porsche GT3R which will be driven by Marc Lieb and Xavier Pompidou, but it was Lawrence Tomlinson’s Team LNT TVR Tuscan team that claimed the honours at Spa, and will look for another trophy to cement the reputation of the Blackpool manufacturer.

Matthew Marsh and Darryl O?Young travel from the People’s Republic of China to drive a GruppeM Porsche GT3R. But the team to cause nightmares for the commentators is definitely Tech 9 Motorsport with three Thai for the Porsche GT3 RS: Chardensukhawatana Nattavude, Sontaya Kunplome and Inthraphuvasak Vutthikorn!

© 2005 Planetlemans.com.