Analysis

Happy New Year from Planetlemans!

2008 is behind us…2009 has started. We wish all of our readers a Happy New Year! With the fireworks gone up in the air and the champagne bottles empty it is time to focus on the year ahead. Despite tough economic times there is a lot to come in 2009!

Here at Planetlemans we will once again have extensive coverage of the three major international series - the Le Mans Series, the FIA GT Championship and the American Le Mans Series - as well as the 77th 24 Hours of Le Mans and several other championships.

2009 will most likely be a season that is rather different in comparison with other years. Having been in the ALMS since 2000 Audi Motorsport will end its full-time involvement in the USA as well as its LMS programme. The Porsche RS Spyder will be rare sight, after dominating LMP2 for the last couple of years.

But it is not all doom and gloom in the endurance racing world! Despite fears that the ALMS will have small grids throughout the year the 57th Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring will be one of the highlights of the season. The Audi R15 will make its race debut in March (in what will be Audi’s final ALMS race for now) while Acura will steps up to LMP1 with the new ARX-02. Sebring will also mark the long-awaited return of BMW to GT racing as the new BMW M3 GTR makes its debut in the ALMS GT2 class.

Over in Europe the Le Mans Series has ditched its traditional Monza race for what should become a fascinating and challenging night race on the brand new Autodromo do Algarve in Portugal. (We are really looking forward to this event!) So far the potential number of entries for the Le Mans Series looks very good.

The FIA GT Championship will be going into a transitional year as the current GT1 spec cars, like the Maserati MC12, Corvette C6.R and the Aston Martin DBR9, will not be eligible for racing in 2010. Expect some new names like the Ford GT and the Nissan GT-R to join the championship throughout 2009 as teams prepare their cars for a full-time attack in 2010.

Series like the FIA GT3 Championship, British GT, Belgian GT Championship, ADAC GT Masters and the brand new Dutch GT4 Championship seem to be in good shape as well, with several of them joining selected rounds of the Le Mans Series and the FIA GT Championship.

We can hardly wait to get the season started and have fireworks at the track again…can you?