12 Hours of Sebring 2010

[Sean H]

the Puegeots were more worried about testing Monday than running any kind of real pace during the 12 hours. Tearing up a car was going to be unacceptable.

[dumrick]

the Puegeots were more worried about testing Monday than running any kind of real pace during the 12 hours. Tearing up a car was going to be unacceptable.

Tearing up a car IS unacceptable in a top factory endurance team. At least, they raced, Audi just showed up Monday for testing.

[Saribro]

I believe the funniest thing to be that, with the narrower Diesel restrictors in place this year, there is obviously less pace advantage, but there is now a HUGE fuel economy advantage from the Diesel camp...

They've reduced the diesel tank size before, it's bound to happen again.

[dumrick]

They've reduced the diesel tank size before, it's bound to happen again.

Well, the ACO will surely reduce them for 2011, along with the downsized engine capacities (even if the regulations aren't known yet).

But, I don't believe that's going to happen for 2010. I believe it could be done by switching the deformable tanks, but are there usually access holes made for this?

Furthermore, Peugeot was already politicking at Sebring, pointing at how much more straight line speed the AMR Lola had, compared to the Peugeots (Bruno Famin, the technical director, was honest enough and said that seeing AMR with such a low level of downforce was "a bit bizarre", but the boss, Olivier Quesnel was already saying something like "they are very fast in straights, we've already pointed that to the ACO, but nothing to do, it will be tough at Le Mans"). So, after the weight increase and the smaller restrictors imposed this year, the ACO has no margin left to impose further restrictions on Diesels.

[RacingManiac]

Peugeot's ALLOWED pace....

Well, they were ALLOWED to race each other and, bar endurance-specific factors, like the need to preserve tyres or fuel, I didn't see any signs they were performance-limited.

I believe the funniest thing to be that, with the narrower Diesel restrictors in place this year, there is obviously less pace advantage, but there is now a HUGE fuel economy advantage from the Diesel camp...

Yes but we knows of nothing as to if the car was limited in anyway....and from the drivers themselves they are only pacing to some extent, all they try is to be faster than the petrol car......Their fastest lap was slower than last year during the entire race weekend. But 6 weeks before the race, Audi was testing at Sebring(with 2009 bodywork, and 2010 restrictor) was running some 2 sec faster than Peugeot's race pace(reportedly in 1:43 range). Considering a year back Peugeot was faster than the Audi, more than likely they were held back from running all out.....

Aston was just as much playing to the rule. They had no competition(or so they thought, as the Drayson car was more than a match for them pace wise) they are trying to bait ACO for more diesel cut(which was what Peugeot implied). At anyrate, all this talk for diesel cut is still misguided in that they are still being out spent by the manufacturers by a huge margin(Audi made a interim "2010 special" for god sakes, only usable for 1 year...) How is the Aston or the Oreca of this world expect to win....diesel or otherwise....

[Pandamasque]

Audi made a interim "2010 special" for god sakes, only usable for 1 year...

That was more like a necessity unless they were going to miss Le Mans. The 2009 aero was a complete disaster at that track and with no updates they would be thrashed by Peugeots and possibly beaten by Lolas and Zyteks too.

[vyselegend]

Asked by Motors TV about that first stint when he was pushed so hard by Pirro, Bourdais told: "We have two modes with the engine mapping, one to help overtaking, and the other for being sure we reach the checkered flag. On the second mode it is not possible to keep the Lola behind."

The way that first stint unfolded, it seems drivers weren't allowed to use that "engine boost" indeed. Maybe they weren't for the whole race. I think they were going as fast as they could (especially the penultiem stint), but the car never left the safe zone mode.

The team repeated several times that new restrictor rules hurt them more with the big V12 than smaller engines (like Audi's V10, but more specifically they seems to think the best diesel engine layout for the new rules would be a V8). Reduced restrictors an reduced turbo compression made them lose about 40HP if we believe them (which we aren't, obviously, so let's guess they claimed back 15 to 20HP by tweaking and pushing engine development, making for an overall 20HP loss), and aero rules made them lose straight line top speed, but that factor is the same for everyone, so that is cancelled out. Sort of.

I don't think that 20HP loss should make them worry about their competition pace-wise, given the margin they had before. So my bet is that they really lost some pace, but volontary. Because they weren't going to use the V12 potential in terms of power with those rules, they tweaked it mostly toward fuel economy.

I'm still a bit mad at Audi not racing (at least with one lab-car, as Peugeot did in 2008), especially because that missed race test (the best test for a LM car before june) may hurt them later.
But Rockenfeller crashed the R15+ tub on turn 17 straight on the first test last monday ( ), and seing the team apparently had no spares, it underlines that they really weren't ready.
Still, had they chosen to race it last saturday, they would be in a better position now even if they still crashed it, bacause they would have had two days to fly spares to the US and keep testing again.

Monday before the crash:


pic of the crashed R15 here

[marcush.]

fly in the R15+ after the race to go testing ...sometimes i fail to understand what
teams are thinking ...
and drivers crashing the one and only car on the first stint of testing ..knowing you have not a second car or the peices to build one in pieces waiting in the pits ,let alone the time to do so.. what a waste of recources..reason for the off ,anyone?

[RacingManiac]

driver error? Rocky is not exactly famous for NOT crashing cars....

It makes sense for Peugeot to dial the car back but let the drivers push....otherwise you lose concentration....