[LM24] Thoughts on 2004 Le Mans

[FIRE]

LMP1
Audi
They are still the best. Normally they would be 1,2,3 and 4. With the new R9 they will dominate the next couple of years.

Taurus Sports Racing
The Judd powered car performed well and was raced for a long time around 10th spot. At the end of the race they had technical problems and ended at 20th place. The Caterpiller engine was not ready for racing.

Rollcentre Racing
They did a great job and together with Kondo they were the big surprise.

Kondo Racing
The performance of the Japanese Dome was very good. I think the Mugen engine is on the same pace as the Judd or Zytek engines and also the Yokohamo tyres are good.

Panoz Motorsports
Great "Ugly" car but far of the pace. ACO had better choosen Creation or AutoCon.

Racing for Holland
As Dutchman I followed this team very close. A lott of technical problems, but they showed again that they belong at LM with 2 cars. The gearbox incident will not bring Jan and ACO closer. Hope Jan Lammers can find some big sponsors else the team has a dark future....

Pescarolo
Best of the rest for the 2nd car, the other a DNF due to technical problems. I think the Judd GV5 engines performed well.

Lister Racing
100 laps down to the winning Audi but they made it. Hope the Danes are continue the Lister project next season so Pearce can develop the car.

Zytek Engineering
A very fast car, but not reliable. But I think Zytek is the customer car of the near future.

RML
And still not an AER which is running after 24h.

Intersport Racing
Noel del Bello
Team Nasamax
Sorry, no opinion about these teams.

[pirenzo]

Audis. Well, as you say, still the best

Pescarolos. definitely best of the rest, but still needs a little more pace

Racing For Holland. They were a bit disappointing it has to be said, though through no fault of the driver crews.

Kondo. Excellent job

Rollcenter. Never very quick I felt, but still in the right places when they needed to be, until that big shunt (and it was a big one)

Zytek. Great quali performance, though they never really brought the fight to the others in the race.

[jc_nl]

Realy impressed bij the kondo, I did not expect it would be on par with the RfH domes.

But not sure if is is the kondo performing great of the RfH cars being rather well uhhhh ....... lets just say one race a year isn't enough. And the situation with the entry for the second car didn't help either.

Rollcentre did great to, it showed that the dallara is a good car (as it should be being developt after the R8)

Pesca, impressive to see what they can do with loosing 70 kg and gaining 70 hp. Should have been an epic privateer batle. wich they would have won, the rollcentre crash and RfH troubles stole a bid of their glory I think

lister, rml, etc etc a bid bland realy they didn't realy come into play.

Not sure about the NASAMAX expected a bit more from that, but that could be down to the engine.

oooops forgot about the audi's
weel ehat is their to say, the were the best, they are the best and will stay the best till the new cars come in to play. Nice to say the lowest ranking audi win tough.

[jhansen]

My thoughts:

Outstanding performance by Goh and the #88 Veloqx car. My only qualm was the move Davies tried on the #64 Corvette that caused a shunt. With that said, Davies impressed me with his speed and surely Guy Smith must be under rated. And what can you say about Tommy K, unbelievable record. The #5 and #88 kept their cars the cleanest so to speak and were there at the end. Great battle between them in the closing hours.

Hats off to Champion and the crew for the #8 Veloqx car. Champion had that car out in less than 30 minutes time, wow! And for the #8 team to even continue and salvage a 5th overall, awesome! Incredible machines those R8s. One of my disappointments of the race was not seeing these two cars there to fight the other sister Audis. I have no doubt they all would have been in striking distance of each other at the end. And McNish, monumental effort to get that thing to the pits only to collapse. Hope he recovers well. A true racer.

The Pescarolos proved me right. Very competitive and the GV5 is the right choice in my opinion. Pleasant surprise to see the secondary car come thru. Although these guys proved to be quite quick. Only negative here was Bourdais and that stupid move on Martin Short, and then his arrogance afterwords. Wonder what he was thinking when he saw the #6 smack the wall? Rollcentre again proved solid. They just keep their heads down and plug away.

The rest of the LMP1's were up and down. Too bad for RfH, they had their hands full. I wonder if we'll even see them in the remainder of the LMES? I do admire and cheer them though. Hats off to Kondo and NASAMAX. The Lister seems to be lacking something. And as for the light weight LMP1's, I just don't think this is the way to go for endurance racing. It's a lot to ask. But the Zytek sure is quick. This car will be scary at the Nurburgring and could do some house cleaning in the ALMS with it's sprint race heavy schedule.

I have no comments about the LMP2 teams, except that this class is lacking real racing (on the track).

GTS,too bad it was a mess. The Prodive-Corvette battle started off in amazing fashion. But the Corvette boys proved that you should never quit, especially when you're at Le Mans.

GT didn't thrill me too much. I'd like to see something more from this class.

Finally, a big thanks to Speed. Tons of coverage that made my weekend!

All in all, a great race!

[FIRE]

Too bad for RfH, they had their hands full. I wonder if we'll even see them in the remainder of the LMES? I do admire and cheer them though.

Probably not due to lack of money.
The RfH drivers did a great job. In Holland Kaneishi had not a good name due to all his crashes in DTM last year, but in the Dome he was fast and reliable.

[19dodge]

it was a very exciting race, however, it really got me mad at the way Sebastien Bourdais acted. if he said he was sorry, ok,, i wouldnt be as mad.. but he blamed it on Shorty!! and now, Martin's ankle is messed up + a totalled car (broken tub) they may not even get out for the next LMES round!! (it will be a miricle if they do).. they do have a 2nd chassis, but im sure it isnt as developed.


just so sad to see such a hard working team get taken out by that way. however, what goes around, comes around. Bourdais stopped on track and retired....

[jhansen]

Just to add something. This is a 24 hour race. The drivers could be a little more patient. Especially the ones from the top budget teams. Teams like Rollcentre don't have the resources growing on trees to just bounce back from something like that. Behavior like this can take teams out for the season, either via lack of resources, or just getting sour on the whole deal all together. I hope to see them back. They are a welcomed addition to the LMES and prototype racing.

[dretceterini]

VAG is pretty much unbeatable, be it Bentley, Audi, or whatever brand name they choose to put on their cars. Seems that anyone who runs the AER motors has trouble for some reason.

[Hauptmann6]

Nobody's mentioned the biggest suprise and most notable part of the race...

THE MORGAN FINISHED!!!!

[pirenzo]

Originally posted by 19dodge
it was a very exciting race, however, it really got me mad at the way Sebastien Bourdais acted. if he said he was sorry, ok,, i wouldnt be as mad.. but he blamed it on Shorty!! and now, Martin's ankle is messed up + a totalled car (broken tub) they may not even get out for the next LMES round!! (it will be a miricle if they do).. they do have a 2nd chassis, but im sure it isnt as developed.


just so sad to see such a hard working team get taken out by that way. however, what goes around, comes around. Bourdais stopped on track and retired....

You can't blame Martin's ankle on Bourdais, the suspension failure was 5 laps later which doesn't sound much but remember that's more like 20 laps of a Grand Prix. If that failure was directly related to the Bourdais clash then you'd have expected it to happen within a lap.

[JAG]

Right, performance of Le Mans 2004, easy, the works Courage C65. A 3.41 in qualifying and upto 6th after around 6 hours in the race.

Biggest dissapointment, RFH. For how long is this team going to underperform. They were blown away by Pescarolo and even upstarts Rollcentre. Its about time RFH started to perform at Le Mans. To make matters worse they will not compete in the LMES, so will drop further behind the race sharpened oppostion.

Another great performance was from NASAMAX. They managed a 3.41 during the race, quicker than in qualifying. Its performance shows that a 2004 spec car will have the beating of the 2003 cars next year. Also quickest on the straights.

Zytek were unfortunate with punctures as they were as quick as the Audis when they retired. Must be the favourites for pole at the next 3 LMES events, and up for the race win if they can last.

Lister had a steady performance and hopefully there new 2004 spec car will improve on the current car.

Taurus deserved 2 entries at LM due to there support of the LMES/ALMS and commitment to diesal power. However they desperatly need new chassis to replace the aging Lola chassis.

Kondo performed great and the Mugen engine is now very good. Someone should take Mugen up on there apparent offer of a works backed engine program.

As for Audi, great performance once again, but the R9 will not have as easy a time as the R8. If the expected manufactuers turn up in LMP1 they Audi will be challenged at last. Everyone said the 956/962 were unbeatable, until Jaguar and Mercedes turned up.

[jhansen]

A few optomistic comments perhaps.

The Courage C65 proved it was quick, darn quick at that. But I rate a car on more than just outright pace. None of the C65's were classified for the finish. This class needs reliability and fast. If you put a reliable motor in this car will it still be as fast? And the light cars will always get punished at this race. Here's another chassis that should be running in the ALMS. It was a pleasant surprise, but not performance of the race IMO (maybe qualifying).

The Zytek, yeah it's fast, but favorite for pole for the remainder of the LMES? Um, maybe at Nurburgring. This car is underpowered compared to the Audis. Champion and Goh were passed before the second Mulsanne chicane and the Pescarolo was soon by as well. This car will be like the Lola B160 and be able to win at selected circuits. But, in North America it would be very potent. The real question is what will it take to make the light-weight cars reliable?

[JAG]

I would put big money on the Zytek being on pole at the last 3 LMES races. In fact I think pole at Le Mans could easily have been theres if they had more qualifying runs, and a clear track.

Wallace and Brabham said at the start they took it slowly and got into a rythem. By the time they retired they were lapping as quick as the Audis.

I think all the teams running the Courage will eventually switch to the AER as it has such a performance advantage. It is now onto the EVOII development and has made big improvements. If a 3l F1 engine can put out 900bhp+ I see no reason why the AER cannot be reliable with 500BHP.

A lot of AER engined cars retirements have also been put down to the engine, when it has been other components and sytems that have let the car down. The Courage was originally held up with gearbox trouble, after around 6 hours of trouble free running, and I have yet to see conformation that they retired with engine troubles.

[paul-collins]

Originally posted by pirenzo
You can't blame Martin's ankle on Bourdais, the suspension failure was 5 laps later which doesn't sound much but remember that's more like 20 laps of a Grand Prix. If that failure was directly related to the Bourdais clash then you'd have expected it to happen within a lap.

I have to disagree - first off, the loading is peculiar to that particular corner (and perhaps the Dunlop sweeps before TR). Secondly, this track doesn't have much more by way of corners than a 2.5ish mile GP circuit.

I'd say the suspension failure was specifically related ot the punt.

[dretceterini]

It's not the AER engines specifically, but every car that runs the engine seems to have far more than the "average" number of problems. Maybe it has something to do with the plumbing and the heat caused by the turbo, as the only turbo car that seems to have few problems is the Audi.

[sportscarsRULE]

For those who were there: what did the diesel sound like?

[jhansen]

Let's place some bets JAG!

I'm sure the Zytek was the only car in qualifying to experience trouble with traffic. You could easily say that one or more of the Audis had traffic trouble as well in qualifying. It's virtually impossible to get a good clean lap around that track for a flier. And as I said, the Goh and Champion cars wasted little time in passing the Zytek when it was healthy at the start. Your point about the Courage's engine is valid, but the reliability of the lighter weight prototypes is still in serious question.

[Hooper]

Originally posted by sportscarsRULE
For those who were there: what did the diesel sound like?

It sounded like the wind...........
I couldn't recognize the original sound of a diesel engine as xtreet cars make.

[JAG]

Originally posted by jhansen
Let's place some bets JAG!

I'm sure the Zytek was the only car in qualifying to experience trouble with traffic. You could easily say that one or more of the Audis had traffic trouble as well in qualifying. It's virtually impossible to get a good clean lap around that track for a flier. And as I said, the Goh and Champion cars wasted little time in passing the Zytek when it was healthy at the start. Your point about the Courage's engine is valid, but the reliability of the lighter weight prototypes is still in serious question.

Zytek chose not to run many laps on Thursday as they had the race engine and gearbox fitted. If they had more running they could have gone quicker. With 4 Audis, doing many laps, the best they could manage was a 3.32, while one Zytek doing a dozen laps managed a 3.33.

[Fab]

Originally posted by sportscarsRULE
For those who were there: what did the diesel sound like?

Like an electrical engine : no sound !

[bernard b]

Originally posted by sportscarsRULE
For those who were there: what did the diesel sound like?

pathetic ...

even the safety cars sounded better

[Dunlop Corner]

A shame that the ACO did not hand out penalties for stupid driving. Bourdais and Davies should have gotten one!

Both ruined another top car's race because of their incompetence. The Corvette lost the race right their, but was lucky that the Ferrari failed.

[Fieldgate]

Originally posted by pirenzo
You can't blame Martin's ankle on Bourdais, the suspension failure was 5 laps later which doesn't sound much but remember that's more like 20 laps of a Grand Prix. If that failure was directly related to the Bourdais clash then you'd have expected it to happen within a lap.

It wasn't 5 laps, it was the 2nd after the initial pit visit. The wishbone sheared at the upright and yes it was directly related to Kermit's impetuosity...Martin was planning to let him through at the 1st chicane on the Mulsanne.

What goes around comes around. Mr B deserves a big-one when he has a 2&1/2 year old son watching in the pits. Fortunately for him he didn't come down for a stop & go penalty with our mechanics.

I suspect the car would probably have beaten the 18....

[jhansen]

Ah JAG, so now the Audi conspiracy comes out. The Audis are separate from each other. They all draw on the same information that the factory gives each team, but they're separate. If you don't want to believe it, that's up to you. The only Audis sharing data were the two Veloqx cars. Each team clearly had their own strategy. As for number of laps, that simply points out the strength of the cars. Face it, the Audis could have gone quicker as well. Ah yes, and fastest lap of the race...well an Audi of course.

[kdr]

thoughts? well firstly i'd like to thank the surrey tvr owners club for bringing along their giant purple view obliterating flags to the podium ceremony.