American Le Mans Series
Montagny to join Andretti Green Racing in the ALMS
© Planetlemans - Gabriel Portos
Andretti Green Racing (AGR) announced today it has signed Franck Montagny to become the primary driver of the #26 XM Satellite Radio Acura ARX-01b for the remainder of the 2008 American Le Mans Series (ALMS) season, beginning with the next tour stop at Lime Rock Park in Lakeville, Ct.
Bryan Herta and Christian Fittipaldi handled the driving duties for Andretti Green in the four previous ALMS starts this season along with Marco Andretti, who rounded out the AGR lineup in the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring.
A variety of drivers will team with Montagny during the final seven ALMS events of 2008 beginning with Marco Andretti, who drives one of Andretti Green’s four IndyCar Series machines. Andretti will qualify for the IndyCar Series event on July 11 at Nashville Superspeedway and then travel to Lime Rock for the July 12th running of the American Le Mans Northeast Grand Prix. Following the ALMS event, he will return to Nashville for the Firestone Indy 200 later that night.
Montagny brings a diverse background to AGR that includes seven Formula 1 starts, all in 2006 with Super Aguri, and stints as a Formula 1 test driver and third driver with Renault, Jordan and Toyota. The 30-year old Frenchman owns three top-five finishes in his last three starts in the 24 Hours of Le Mans, including a third-place overall finish earlier this month.
Montagny ran four races for his native France during the 2007-08 A1 Grand Prix (A1GP) season, scoring one top-five finish and helping his team to a fourth-place final ranking. He also has one IndyCar Series start to his credit, having made his debut at Long Beach this past April where he scored a runner-up finish.
Franck Montagny, #26 XM Satellite Radio Acura: “I’m very excited to join Andretti Green Racing and the XM Acura program. I am looking forward to working with the team in the very near future and hoping to get off to a good start at Lime Rock. I know how competitive the American Le Mans Series is and know how challenging this will be, but I believe I am ready for it. I am eager to get started.”
Michael Andretti, co-owner, Andretti Green Racing: “We’re looking forward to seeing what Franck can do in the XM Acura. He’s got a lot of experience in different types of cars, including prototypes, and that should help him adjust pretty quickly to what we’re doing here. “Making a change in the middle of the season isn’t something you enjoy, and I think it’s even tougher in this case because we’re talking about Bryan and Christian. Bryan has done everything we’ve ever asked him to do since he joined Andretti Green in 2003, including helping us win the 12 Hours of Sebring in our first ALMS start last year. Christian joined us this year and wanted to win as badly as we did. We will always appreciate the effort that both Bryan and Christian gave to the team.”
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Great news!
Franck is a very fast guy, which he has proven many times in sportscars. I will look forward to see what he can do in the Acura. he would be able to fight the Porsches, eventhough the Acura still have some disadvantages compared to the RS Spyder.
Go for them Franck, about time!
So what’s with Herta and Fittipaldi, then? Did they get fired? Or just moved to Indy?
What a great new!! I’m very pleased to see Frank behind the wheel. After all he did in his career, he really deserves. This year, he was quite spectacular in Le Mans, nearly as quick as Sarazin, whether dry or wet. We do not have to forget that he nearly discovered the 908 HDI at that moment compared to Steph Sarazin… or the other Peugeot drivers. Very impressive.
It’s a about time. Bryan Herta was a good driver but last year he made many mistakes. In the final race at Laguna Seca they kept Tony Kanaan in for the final 3 hours because HErta was so mistake prone. And This year Christian Fittipaldi is just not up to pace. Marco Andretti was much faster than Christian and Herta at Sebring.
However I think if Michael Andretti really wanted to go for it he would have Kanaan and Marco in the car. But that would not be good for Tony Kanaan’s Indy championship hopes.
The line up for petit LeMans should be Tony Kanaan, Montagny and Marco Andretti.
On a side note since this is pretty much a Honda team and Montagny was a Honda driver if they could get Montagny I’m sure they could have access to Anthony Davidson and Tacuma Sato. Montagny couldn’t outpace either of them at Super Aguri.
Now that Dario Franchitti is out of NASCAR pleeeeeeease pair him up with Montagny.
Come on Michael Andretti. You know you’ll finally be able to hunt down those Porsches. And what a boost for the series that would be. An Indy and Daytona 24 hour champion in the mix!!!
XM sattelite would probably pick up the tab on him themselves.
Dario could just race in ARCA or something else