24 Hours of Le Mans
Flying Lizards getting ready for Le Mans
© American Le Mans Series
The Lizards have closed up their home shop at Infineon Raceway for the month of June: the Flying Lizard No. 80 Porsche and its complement of crew and drivers are off to France for the team’s fourth consecutive 24 Heures du Mans. The team arrives this week in the historic town of Le Mans, near the Loire Valley, to prepare for the renowned 24-hour race on a 8.5-mile road course. The official test day is June 1; the race starts on June 14 at 3 pm CET and ends 24 hours later on June 15.
The 2008 Lizard drivers for Le Mans will be Joerg Bergmeister (Germany), Johannes van Overbeek (USA), and Seth Neiman (USA). Bergmeister, a Porsche factory driver, drives the No. 45 Porsche for the Lizards in the ALMS, and currently leads the ALMS GT2 drivers’ championship with teammate Wolf Henzler. van Overbeek pilots the No. 46 Lizard Porsche in the ALMS, and together with teammate Patrick Pilet (France), is in third. Neiman, driving the No. 44 Lizard Porsche (with Darren Law and Lonnie Pechnik), is fourth in the points chase.
All three drivers have significant experience in endurance races. 2008 will be Bergmeister’s seventh race at Le Mans: he finished second in GT2 in 2002 (with Romain Dumas and Sascha Maasen/Freisinger Motorsport), won GT2 in 2004 (with Maassen and Patrick Long/Petersen White Lightning) and was second in GT2 in 2005 (with Patrick Long and Timo Bernhard/Petersen White Lightning). In the ALMS, Bergmeister won the GT2 drivers’ championship in 2005 and 2006 (with Petersen White Lightning), and finished second in 2007 (with van Overbeek/Flying Lizard).
van Overbeek and Neiman have competed together in three consecutive Le Mans events, finishing third in 2005 and fourth in 2006. van Overbeek has driven with the Lizards since 2004: notable results include winning the Porsche Cup in 2007 [which ranks the top private (non-factory) Porsche drivers worldwide] and finishing in the top three in the ALMS drivers’ championships every year since 2004. Teammate Neiman is currently ranked fourth in the ALMS GT2 drivers’ championship, counting a strong ALMS season start with a 2nd place finish at the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring (with Law and Pechnik).
It will be the second year that the three drivers — Bergmeister, van Overbeek and Neiman — have driven together at Le Mans. In 2007 the trio saw their podium hopes dashed early in the race when the No. 80 Porsche, which had been the fastest GT2 car on track, was retired at hour 10 due to mechanical problems.
Team principal and driver Seth Neiman, reflects on the 24 Heures du Mans, “The team is honored be able to return this year. To compete at Le Mans, one of the most storied races in the world is an experience that simply cannot be duplicated anywhere else. This will be our fourth race here. Each year, we learn and understand more about the track, the competition, and how we as a team need to prepare. Having to retire so early in 2007 was heartbreaking — the crew, the drivers, everyone had worked so hard. But we learned a great deal about what it takes to win in this race: strength, speed, and endurance are crucial, but in the end, it’s the ability to plan for, and recover from every eventuality that gets you to the podium.”
The No. 80 Porsche will sport the team’s familiar red and silver livery as run in the American Le Mans Series, with robin’s egg blue accents on the windshield banner and mirrors.
Follow the Race
The test day and race will be broadcast on SpeedTV in North America and MotorsTV in Europe. For details see www.speedtv.com. The Lizards will broadcast their team radio during the race. For details, see www.lizardms.com.. Radio Le Mans will provide English-language broadcast via Internet and terrestrial radio. For details see www.radiolemans.com.
Flying Lizard merchandise will be available on site during race week in the vendor village at the Circuit de la Sarthe. For more information, see www.lizardms.com.
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Neiman is paying for it, but why not have Timo Bernhard or Wolf Henzler race?
Henzler is driving for IMSA Performance Matmut. I don’t see Bernhard in any of the rosters. I really hope these guys do it this year. They’re looking good in the ALMS running so far and I’m sure Neiman won’t be holding the team back. (He’ll likely drive shorter or fewer stints than the other two)
Won’t hold them back? About 2-3 seconds per lap….
Yes he’ll get few stints but with four solid Ferrari’ teams, I believe you can’t afford to give up any pace at any point in the race.
The Porsche is faster in a straight line, however over a lap that comes out to basically NOTHING on the time sheet as the Ferrari is faster through the twisty bits (Porsche curves) and I would say can more than likely hit the chicanes harder than the Porsche.
Tire wear is the key to this race and I feel until Porsche can prove they can double and even triple stint the tires without loosing time overall, you can’t dismiss a couple of key stints at night or even early in the race which is most likely to happen.
You don’t think Porche’s overall level of competition against Ferrari in the ALMS so far is an indication of their competitiveness for LeMans? I realize it’s a different track completely from what we’re used to seeing stateside but the straight line speed might make up for the slight handling deficit.
Tafel is the current benchmark for the Lizards, being nearly even on points and we saw the close battles trough the tight road and street circuits in the ALMS. I think the “x-factor” is Risi though, who have shown blistering speeds through practice and qualifying but thus far, their reliability has been left wanting.
I hope Porsche was paying attention to those lap times and not sitting on their laurels contented by the race results for Flying Lizard because some of them have been out of luck. My point is though, Anthony, that in a 24 hour race, those few seconds that Neiman loses won’t be nearly the insurmountable hindrance that they would be in ALMS sprint format.
You’re right on the tire wear issue. If Porsche can make a back-asswards rear engined car overcome its inherent shortcomings would be amazing. The weight distribution makes that task nearly impossible, I’m sure. I’ve seen stranger things though.