24 Hours of Le Mans

CARE Ferraris out of GT1 Fight

© Planetlemans

Car 50 – Larbre Compétition (chassis 117110 -
Jean-Luc Blanchemain/Patrick Bornhauser/Gabriele Gardel Rtd 1045 hrs - clutch

Car 61 – Russian Age Racing/Cirtek (chassis 113136 – 3)
Nigel Smith/Tim Sugden/Christian Vann Rtd 0230 hrs - engine

Car 67 – Convers MenX Team (chassis 108391 – 9)
Peter Kox/Robert Pergl/Alexey Vasiliev Rtd 0800 hrs - accident

The retirement of the Larbre Competition no. 50 car due to clutch problems signalled the end of the Ferrari fight for Le Mans honours in 2006. Jean-Luc Blanchemain was at the wheel when he lost drive at the second chicane of the Mulsanne straight.
Despite an illustrious past here at La Sarthe, this year wasn’t to be a lucky one for the three privately owned teams which, with Care Racing’s support, were up against the might and resources of the Aston Martin and Corvette factory teams.

There was no one reason that the Ferraris did not make it to the chequered flag, but a variety of technical problems combined with a large dose of bad luck meant that this would be the first time since 2003 that a Prodrive-built Care Racing Ferrari 550 Maranello has not reached the end of the race.

Larbre Compétition and the Convers MenX Team will now re-prepare their cars for the FFSA French GT Championship and Le Mans Series respectively, and will be racing again for victories in the very near future.