Saturday Sessions
The second day's testing at Paul Ricard began with at least the promise of some better conditions, although the skies remained overcast and the early-morning track conditions were not conducive to fast lappery. The day's schedule followed a similar pattern:
Saturday 12 March 2011
- 08:30 Drivers' meeting - Mandatory for the drivers who did not drive on the 11th
- 09:00 Opening of the track
- 12:30 14:30 Lunch at the panoramic restaurant
- 13:00 End of the morning session
- 13:15 13:45 Pit Walk for VIP Guests
- 14:00 Re-opening of the track
- 18:00 End of the session for all teams
- 22:00 Paddock closes
The Morning
The first hour of the Saturday session saw the previous day's pattern repeated, although times were significantly slower. The track took a long time to pick up temperature, and most cars were several seconds away from making improvements.
Fastest overall, once again, was the Quifel ASM Zytek, with the TDS Norma setting the pace in LMP2. Tommy Erdos had the RML HPD running third in class, but a 1:55.215 was still two seconds shy of his best time from Friday morning.
The Brazilian spent much of the morning strapped into the cockpit but not going far, remaining static in the garage for several lengthy periods while the team worked around him.
Overnight the mechanics had made some adjustments to the braking system, and brief periods on track were being alternated with pitlane sessions for fine-tuning. "The conditions on track were also extremely difficult," suggested Tommy. "The weather didn't seem to want to make up its mind what to do next, and it was drizzling, then stopping, blowing hard, then stopping. It was hard to determine a suitable set-up." Towards the end of the morning the light drizzle briefly turned heavier, and effectively cleared the track of cars for about half an hour or more. Few teams were keen to risk new cars on a greasy track. "We managed to do some comparison runs on different Dunlop tyre compounds, but the results were fairly inconclusive, thanks to the conditions."
Confirmation came through earlier in the day to say that one of the two Aston Martin Virages had suffered suifficient damage in yesterday's shunt to send the "Young Driver AMR" team home early. Both cars went off at the same place, in replica incidents, but the Jota car, #79, came off better, and after some remedial repairs, has been back in action again today. Even so, just 26 on track for Day Two, and a fair few of those weren't clocking up many laps.
Tommy went out again right at the end of the session, but only to warm up the engine and tyres in anticipation of the rolling photoshoot. Each year the Series organisers arange a track shot session for selected entrants, and the RML HPD was chosen to follow in the tyretracks of last year's Lola HPD, which features on the official poster for this year's opening race of the season.
Times for Session 3
|
No. |
Team |
Drivers |
Car |
Session
2 |
1 |
12 |
Rebellion Racing |
Prost, Jani, Bleekemolen |
Lola B10/60 Coupé Toyota |
1:47.928 |
2 |
20 |
Quifel-ASM
Team |
Amaral, Pla |
Zytek 09SC |
1:48.433 |
3 |
13 |
Rebellion Racing |
Belicchi, Boullion, Smith |
Lola B10/60 Coupé Toyota |
1:49.632 |
4 |
16 |
Pescarolo |
Collard, Tinseau, Jousse |
Pescarolo Judd |
1:50.751 |
5 |
46 |
TDS Racing |
Beche, Thiriet |
Oreca 03 Nissan |
1:51.133 |
6 |
40 |
Race Performance |
Frey, Meichtry |
Oreca 03 Judd |
1:52.471 |
7 |
39 |
Pecom Racing |
Companc, Russo, Kaffer |
Lola B11/40 Judd |
1:54.069 |
8 |
44 |
Extreme Limite |
Rosier, Luco, Basso |
Norma M200P Judd |
1:54.589 |
9 |
36 |
RML AD Group |
Erdos, Newton, Collins |
Honda ARX-01d HPD |
1:55.217 |
10 |
43 |
RLR Motorsport |
Gates, Garofall, Phillips |
MG Lola EX265 Judd |
1:56.039 |
11 |
92 |
Neil Garner Motorsport |
Hartshorne, Keating, Keen |
Formula
Le Mans |
1:56.506 |
12 |
91 |
Hope
Polevision |
Tinguely, Moro |
Formula
Le Mans |
1:57.776 |
13 |
95 |
Pegasus Racing |
Schultis, Simon |
Formula
Le Mans |
1:58.770 |
14 |
99 |
JMB Racing |
Rodrigues |
Formula
Le Mans |
1:59.095 |
15 |
89 |
Hankook Farnbacher |
Farnbacher, Simonsen |
Ferrari F430 |
2:00.492 |
16 |
70 |
Kessel Racing |
Bromiszewski, Peter |
Ferrari F430 |
2:00.771 |
17 |
75 |
Prospeed Competition |
Holzer, Goossens |
Porsche 911 RSR |
2:01.022 |
18 |
51 |
AF Corse |
Fisichella, Bruni |
Ferrari F458 Italia |
2:01.119 |
19 |
72 |
AF Corse |
Kauffman, Waltrip, Aguas |
Ferrari F430 |
2:01.373 |
20 |
76 |
IMSA Performance Matmut |
Pilet, Henzler |
Porsche 911 RSR |
2:01.396 |
21 |
77 |
Team Felbermayr Proton |
Lieb, Lietz |
Porsche 911 RSR |
2:01.742 |
22 |
67 |
IMSA Performance Matmut |
Narac, Armindo |
Porsche 911 RSR |
2:02.224 |
23 |
79 |
Jota |
Hancock, Dolan |
Aston Martin Vantage |
2:02.283 |
24 |
82 |
CRS Racing |
Hummel, Christidoulou, Quaife |
Ferrari F430 |
2:02.711 |
25 |
61 |
AF Corse |
Perazzini, Cioci, Lemeret |
Ferrari F430 |
2:04.614 |
26 |
83 |
JMB Racing |
Quick, Missilin, Al Qubaisi |
Ferrari F430 |
2:05.153 |
- |
86 |
Young Driver AMR |
Enge|, Muller, Nygaard |
Aston Martin Vantage |
Absent |
Afternoon Session
The day's final session had been under way for about half an hour before Tommy Erdos took to the track once more. With no sign of any improvement in conditions, it was simply a case of adding more miles to the car, and gathering as much data as time allowed. Ben Collins took his turn in the cockpit mid-afternoon, and set a personal best of 1:55.169. Finally, Mike Newton rounded off the day.
"We've all had time in the car, and clocked up plenty of laps, so that's "mission accomplished" in many ways," said Tommy. "We've done no testing prior to this, never even turned a wheel, and things could have gone very differently for us. Instead, it has been a very encouraging two days. As I said yesterday, the chassis truly is a dream to drive, and the engine has run strongly and reliably throughout. Just like the chassis, that's entirely new to us as well, of course, and HPD has done an excellent job in creating another excellent unit. A trouble-free two day test is always very satisfying."
The mechanics and engineers at RML have worked wonders these past few weeks. "I have just been so impressed by everything they've done," said Tommy. "They built up the car from scratch in less than two weeks. If it had been another Lola, like they've worked on for the last seven or eight years, then that might not be so extraordinary, but it's not. The HPD is totally alien to them, a completely new package, and it's run perfectly. You have to be very skilful to achieve something like that. The team has really pulled together to complete the project on time and, honestly, it's incredible."
"I was absolutely amazed by the job our guys did in getting the car built in such a short time," said Phil Barker, RML Team Manager. "They not only had to build it up, but they also had to incorporate the latest specifications and contend with a new engine installation. There was an awful lot going on, and bearing in mind we weren't able to start until 14th February, I think they did a remarkable job. The car was finally completed at 8:00m on Monday evening, and then trucked straight here. It has been such a relief, after a very stressful period, to see the car on track and knuckle down to learning more about it."
"The handling characteristics are tremendous, a real buzz. Unfortunately, the overall performance is being hampered by the restrictor size and the additional weight we're being made to carry. We can only hope that the ACO recognises this, and makes some adjustments. The ACO tell us that the Le Mans Series is the "spirit of racing", but what we're facing here isn't in the spirit of the sport. There's not a class out there that can't drive by us on the straight, and that's not right."
"These two days have allowed us to learn a great deal about the car, and we've encountered no issues at all," he added. "The whole package has performed faultlessly throughout, and any off-track time has simply been down to the very difficult weather conditions. Even so, it's good to get the first test out of the way, and know that we're in good basic shape for the first race of the year."
"The key things we've learned today is that yesterday was just the start," concluded Mike Newton. "The benefits of analysing the data overnight have allowed us to make several steps forwards, and we're delighted. The chassis itself is a step-change over last year's car, and exceeds all our expectations, but we've found ourselves at the back of the pack, completely uncompetitive. That's wholly due to the way the new regulations have been applied. We can only hope that changes are made before we have to race here next month."
Final times to be added shortly