Misc. Questions about Sports Car Racing

[RM40]

First
Exactly what is the relationship between BMS in FIA GT and Care/Veloqx in ALMS GTS? Are they both built by Prodrive? And what about the other teams in FIA GT fielding the 550s, I noticed the other teams in FIA GT use a different front nose of the car than BMS, so I am guessing they are built by two different companies?

Second
I want to clear up which engines each 550 in the ALMS runs. IIRC, Prodrive has always run their own engines, but I am confused a little about the Olive Garden Ferrari. Is it true that they ran Cladwell engines (same as the R & S MkIIIC, right?) and just switched to Elan power this year, right?

Third
What is the correlation between Carsport America and Carsport Holland? Are they both just teaming up to run the Zonda in their respective series and do R & D for each other? So, it's basically two teams coming together to run and develop the same car, for each other's benefit?

[Dani Filth]

First ..
I think the BMS is Prodrive built

[BSchneiderFan]

Third...

I believe that Carsport Holland and American Viperacing teamed up to develop the Pagani Zonda for the ALMS and FIA GTs, renaming themselves, respectively, Carsport Modena (where the Zonda is built?) and Carsport America. In the absence of Zondas at the moment, Mike Hezemans of Carsport Holland/Modena (owned by his dad, Toine?) has teamed up with Philippe Alliot's Force One Racing to run a pair of Vipers in the FIA GT Championship under the Force One Racing Festina Carsport Banner. Carsport America (American Viperacing as was) is running their old Viper in the ALMS until the Zonda is ready.

[cybersdorf]

About the R&S Mk.IIIc engine: that's not a Caldwell. They had Elan engines until this season; now they are Yates-built.

[Chevyguy]

BSchiederFan, yes, the road car is built in Modena. I beleive the GTS, however many there are, is put together by formerly Carsport Holland, uncluding the Carsport America car. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[cybersdorf]

From what I recall, Carsport has a factory in Italy.

[fabvt]

http://gto-racing.nexenservices.com/...aniZondaGR.htm
I've picked some information about the Pagani Zonda on the superb website of Laurent Duquesne http:\\gto-racing.nexenservices.com .
Carsport Modena comes out of the association of AmericanViper Racing, Carsport Holland and GLPK Racing. They've started a new team, Carsport Modena, base in... Modena, Italy and have granted the exclusivity for the building of Pagani racing cars.
The racing car is uses the same carbon fiber chassis as the road car. Both front and rear sections of the chassis are made of chrome molybden tubes.
The car has a new suspension, a 6-gear Hollinger sequential gearbox, Brembo carbon fiber brakes and a 6 liters Mercedes V12 developping more than 600hp. The engine work is not backed by AMG-Competition but a Belgian motorist, Ernst Breuer. This engine is now 10cm lower and 10cm forward.
The first car was delivered to Carsport America (Wisconsin) just a few weeks before the Sebring 12Hrs.

[BSchneiderFan]

Now that's interesting. Carsport Holland and American Viperacing I knew about, but I had no idea GL-PK was involved.

[C_g]

Originally posted by RM40
First
Exactly what is the relationship between BMS in FIA GT and Care/Veloqx in ALMS GTS? Are they both built by Prodrive? And what about the other teams in FIA GT fielding the 550s, I noticed the other teams in FIA GT use a different front nose of the car than BMS, so I am guessing they are built by two different companies?

Second
I want to clear up which engines each 550 in the ALMS runs. IIRC, Prodrive has always run their own engines, but I am confused a little about the Olive Garden Ferrari. Is it true that they ran Cladwell engines (same as the R & S MkIIIC, right?) and just switched to Elan power this year, right?

First - BMS Scuderia Italia is a racing team that bought Ferrari 550s from Prodrive. These 550s were built and developed by Prodrive at the request/funding of Fredric Dor, a Swiss shipping magnate. His company set up to administer the Ferrari sales/support is called Care Racing.

There are other 550 variants out there. Italtechnica built the first version, which was reworked by Rafanelli. This is currently being run as the Olive Garden car in the ALMS, but first ran in FIA GT a couple years ago. I believe the Italtechnica version is also the basis for the DART car and the current JMB cars as well, though both those have been developed independently since then. Wieth Racing also independently have tried to develop a 550 variant, though not very successfully.

Second - The Olive Garden car used to have Caldwell build their Ferrari V12 engines. As stated above, they are now being tuned by Elan. Caldwell is well-known recently for tuning the V10 Viper engines that ORECA used during their championship-winning years, as well as the short-lived Mopar V8 that was in the ORECA Dallara in 2001.