24 Hours of Le Mans
24 Hours of Le Mans 2009 - GT1 Preview
It should have been the final battle between Corvette and Aston Martin in the last year of the current GT1 specs, but a lack of Aston Martin entries (or GT1 entries overall) will prevent this from happening. Only six LMGT1 cars will be in action at Le Mans: four Corvettes, one Aston Martin and one Lamborghini.
In 2008 it was the #009 Aston Martin Racing Aston Martin DBR9 that won the LM GT1 class, the second time in a row Aston Martin Racing beat Corvette Racing at the 24 Hours of Le Mans. With Aston Martin Racing moving up into LMP1 and only Jetalliance Racing entering a DBR9 it is highly unlikely that Corvette will not win this one. Let’s see who will be racing in which car this year at Le Mans in the GT1 category.
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63-Corvette Racing: Corvette regulars Jan Magnussen and Johnny O’Connell are joined by Antonio Garcia for the endurance events this year. The first time the three drivers raced together was at Sebring in March, a race in which they beat their rivals in the other Corvette C6.R. Despite the ALMS GT1 programme cut short to just Sebring and Long Beach this lack of action in 2009 should not be a disadvantage as the team knows their cars by heart.
© Planetlemans
64-Corvette Racing: Oliver Gavin and Olivier Beretta will be joined by Marcel Fässler at Le Mans. At Le Mans in 2008 and Sebring this year they were beaten by their team mates in the #63 car, but Le Mans is always unpredictable. The advantage of the #64 is that Marcel Fässler knows how it feels like to race the Corvette in a 24 Hours race, as he raced (and won) at Spa-Francorchamps.
© Planetlemans
66-Jetalliance Racing: The only Aston Martin DBR9 in the field is entered by Jetalliance Racing. Top driver Alex Müller is joined by team owner Lukas Lichtner-Hoyer and Thomas Gruber. Despite being a top team in FIA GT in recent years the lack of racing in 2009 in combination with the crew could create some problems. The team raced at the Spa 1000KM in preparation of Le Mans, but despite a surprising pole position it didn’t really go well. Or as team owner Lichtner-Hoyer put it at Spa: “Virtually everything that could go wrong did go wrong this weekend.” Let’s hope for Jetalliance this will not be the same at Le Mans.
© Planetlemans
68-JLOC Isao Noritake: After the withdrawal of the Reiter Engineering Lamborghini Murcielago R-GT this is the only Lamborghini in the field. Its crew will probably be Atsushi Yogo, Koji Yamanishi and Marco Apicella. The last time a JLOC Lamborghini raced at Le Mans was back in 2007, when Marco Apicella destroyed his car in a heavy crash at the first Mulsanne chicane during qualifying and the team was allowed to start with a borrowed DAMS chassis. It only managed to complete one lap before a gearbox failure ended its race on lap 2.
© Planetlemans
72-Luc Alphand Aventures: Luc Alphand is back again with two Corvettes. As usual team owner/driver Luc Alphand is racing together with Patrice Goueslard. Both drivers have raced at Le Mans together on several occasions and also race together in the LMS. At Le Mans the two are joined by Stephan Gregoire, another French driver with lots of experience, most of it in the Indy Racing League and Grand-Am. Last year Gregoire raced for Rollcentre Racing in LMP1. The #72 is the Alphand Corvette with the most experienced line-up and should be capable of finishing as best of the rest behind the works cars.
© Planetlemans
73-Luc Alphand Aventures: The second Alphand Corvette will be driven by Yann Clairay, Xavier Maassen and Julien Jousse. Clairay’s last time at Le Mans was back in 2006 with Paul Belmondo Racing, most people will remember his crash in the Courage C65. Since then the young French driver has raced the Alphand Corvette in the LMS, where he recently won the Spa 1000KM. Maassen will make his debut at Le Mans this year. Fortunately for him he knows the car as he races it in FIA GT and raced another C6.R as well in FIA GT in 2008. Julien Jousse is completely new in GT racing. He races in new Formula 2 series this year and will make his GT debut at Le Mans! Two GT rookies and one driver which race ended early make it hard to say what their chances are.
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Very excited. I wish it were the two works ‘Vettes against the AMR Astons to end the battle. As of now, Corvette Racing has 2, AMR has 2. Let’s go for 3 Corvette!
I really want to see Luc Alphand Aventures win Le Mans. Happy to see Stephan Gregoire is back….
I hope the ‘bad boys’ will race each other into trouble to hand over the class victory to the Jetalliance DBR9. (he-he)
To me this class is a bit of a let down, over the last 4 years we have had some gerat battles between Prodrive and Pratt & Miller, as corvettefan says 2-2 it would have been nice to see a posible decider which I think might have been even closer than last years race.
I can only see this year being a battle between the 2 “works” Corvette’s which might still produce a good close race as we have seen in the past in ALMS with hopefully the #64 car coming out on top, think the Jetalliance Aston might give the a run in the early going if Alex Muller takes the start, think it might also be worth watching how Xavier Massen gose in the Luc Alpand Corvette
Sure, being the Corvette Racing diehard fan that I am, I want to see the team win its class at Le Mans. But only against two non-Corvette teams really dampens the achievement and I’m sure this isn’t the way folks like program head Doug Fehan would like to do it.
At least in 2010, my boys won’t be in walkover land against Porsche, Ferrari, Aston Martin, and Jaguar (assuming Rocketsports gets a bid) when they move to the more competitive GT2 ranks.
it’s gonna be a vette 1,2,3 i think. The two works guys followed by one of the luc alphand guys. The only question is which of the luc alphands will get a podium and which of hte vettes will win. Barring mechanical failures. like a broken drive shaft…
The works vettes won’t start racing each other till after the 12h or 18h mark. They will be pushing to make ground on everybody else first. They have to make they win this one. Preferably one two.
As far as me the vettes don’t need a deciding final race they are the best GT cars. The C6R is the best GT1 car of the two. The car is a winner in the hands of any team (though they only sell it to well funded teams).
And the C6R has made more appearances in various series and won more championships than the DBR9, even though the DBR9 chassis outnumber the C6R in numbers.
Luc Alphand’s #72 car is the most successful GT1 chassis at LeMans, and the ultimate DBR9 killer. It was ALMS champion in GT1 over the official prodrive team and finished 4th overall at LeMans that year in the hands of the Ollies.
Would like to see Antonio Garcia win Le Mans again in a Corvette. He is one of the rising star in GT racing, after winning 2008 Le Mans and this year Daytona 24 Hours, 2009 Le Mans would be splendid for Antonio. Go for it kid !!
Antonio Garcia is the man. The guy is quiet, and does not say much at all, unless he’s interviewed.
Corvette C6.R is a great car. They rarely breaks down at Le Mans. I do remember the #64 Corvette had majory problems in the 2007 Le Mans. Does anybody remember what was the cause??
Antonio Garcia is good in sportscars, but believe it or not he’s not living up to his potential.
Either he hasn’t had good managers or he simply prefers to dominate the GT ranks.
For someone who was running head to head against Fernando Alonso everyone thought he would be running in single seaters or in more exclusive series: Champ car, Indy, F1. Or at least DTM or LeMans Prototypes.
With his skills there has to be a sponsor out there who wouldn’t mind picking up the tab. Just gotta look for them. Most people wonder how he spent all those years at Team Modena. They’re a great team but they didn’t have the best to make him shine.
It’s not until Larbre and BMS were no longer official Aston partners that Team Modena started getting factory support and he started getting noticed.
His next step i the next year or two should be to at least get into a competitive P1 program. If not get a new business manager.
@Christophe
Under the SC period brought on by the crash of the #3 Audi, the #64 Corvette’s carbon fiber driveshaft basically fell apart as the car was rolling along in high gears at low speed. It ground to a halt about 200m out of Arnage corner with the main driveshaft broken.
Thanks Victor
I remember watching the race. But I forgot the cause of the problem. I was going to say driveshaft, but I didnt want to say something wrong at the time.
I do remember Oliver Gavin was driving the car. Becasue he said, he was trying to get the car back to the pits, but the French Marshalls were telling him he could not drive it back. And he could not understand them, because they were speaking French.
I think it was more of a engine related problem. They were talking about driving it back to the pitts on the starter motor. Max Papis was trying to convince Gary Pratt and Dave Binks that he had done it before.
But because the car was pretty close to the pits still it would have been a long way back and wouldn’t have made it.
They couldn’t announce it because then the decoy Astons (BMS and Larbre) will pick up the pace to try to break them. The #3 car had to run a pace to make sure it made it till the end. It probably could have went flat out, but didn’t want to risk 2 DNFs
In the closing hour they picked the pace up again and were closing in, but the safety car did them in. All class leaders begged for the safety car.
During the safety car period (when the #3 Audi went off) the #4 went into cylinder deactivation mode (4 cylinder) to save fuel and to prevent overheating. But somehow all cylinders shut off.
There you have it.
That is if my source is reliable.
Here’s my predictions:
1st: #63 Corvette
2nd: #64 Corvette
3rd: #72 Luc Alphand Corvette
4th: #66 Jetalliance Aston
5th: #73 Luc Alphand Corvette
6th: #68 JLOC Lambo
GT1 has become a joke since Ferrari and Aston Martin (officially) left the class. Now it’s just a bunch f Corvettes running round the track making a racket. There’s no manufacturer’s fight, so what’s the point? I had hoped Audi would put an R8 or two in GT1, but no joy. Oh well…
IN MY HUMBLE OPINION GT1 IS THE ESSENCE OF LE MANS. LE MANS WAS ABOUT TAKING A PRODUCTION VEHICLE AND CONVERTING IT INTO A RACING MACHINE TO SEE IF IT COULD LAST 24 HOURS. LE MANS HISTORY IS FULL OF LEGENDARY GT1 BATTLES. IT IS TRUE THAT SOME TEAMS HAVE PERVERTED THE GT1 RULES TO THEIR ADVANTAGE(DUAR PORSCHE FOR EXAMPLE)BLURRING THE LINE BETWEEN GT1 AND PROTOTYPE ADDING CONFUSION AND INCREASING THE COST OF A GT1 PROGRAM. TO PUT IT SIMPLY THEIR IS A BIG HOLE LEFT ON THE LE MANS GRID WITHOUT THE ULTIMATE EXPRESSION OF MOTOR RACING HISTORY HAVING A STRONG AND LEGITIMATE PRESENCE AT LE MAN. THE ACO HAVE TO REALIZE THIS AND SHOULD BE WORKING ON A SOLUTION FOR THE FUTURE.
Turn your caps off…and there is nothing production about a gt1 car maybe a little bit of shape, but nothing has been production since maybe the late 60’s
@ hunter, audi doesn’t have a gt1 spec audi…