6 Ore di Imola report
Imola was a surprising late addition to the ILMC race calendar, which had originally supposed to contain only two European races apart from the Le Mans race: Spa and Silverstone. The circuit director of Imola was really happy to invite such a great race after many years of not only Formula 1 races but also three 1000 kilometres races in 1974 and then again during the Group C era in 1983 and 1984. Imola administration would like to continue in this tradition, though with the planned calendar for the 2012 WEC season, it does not seem much likely to host another great race like this one. In fact Monza 1000 km race has much more tradition in Italy but it was dropped from the LMS calendar a few year ago due to miserable promotion and attendance. However leading manufacturers of the ILMC series wished to have race in Italy, so the Imola track was chosen. We think it is a nice track and generally we liked it here, we met several local polite people here and there but generally it is a problem in Italy to speak English. As for the track, which is OK, we felt that it is too short was such big race as a joint venture of ILMC and LMS is and also pit boxes are too narrow, considering a fact that many cars but the biggest boys like BMW, Audi or Peugeot had to share two cars in one garage, as only 32 places are available. Generally the track is much more suited for short F1 race with some twenty or so cars than for pure sports car events like this. But unless the teams were unhappy with this, only problem might have been that some of the 60 entries were not originally accepted because the track cannot accommodate more than 53 cars. Despite many of the originally accepted entries were withdrawn actually providing the space for refused cars, only some of them took the option to be invited (mainly two FLM regulars), while several other like Pegasus Courage-Oreca, JMB Ferrari or Gruppe M Porsche 997 did not appear despite there was a room for them.
The final release of entry list contained 50 cars. Among them Guess Racing Europ Lola B09/10 coupe, which was withdraw, as expected and there is a question whether the team really wants to enter some LMS race or entire effort is just a joke. Originally scheduled to run an old Lola spyder from 2005, they are entering a newer coupe from 2009 only to withdrawn it race after race. From the 49 present cars, one crashed in the last practice session (Oreca FLM no.92) and with some damage to the chassis, it was recommended to the team by Oreca to skip the race, so we had 48 actual starters in the race, still a very decent number for the short Imola track where the lap times did not exceed much one minute and half.
Peugeots and Audis seemed to be well matched in all practice sessions and qualifying. Peugeot won the first practice ahead of Audi. The second practice session was wet and Audi did not take it too seriously so Peugeots were one-two ahead of a LMP2 car - TDS Racing Oreca and the only Audi that took at least some part in the session. The third practice session the next day was won by Audi ahead of two Peugeots. The LMP2 class had Boutsen Energy Racing ahead of TDS Racing in both dry practice sessions. Both teams were running Oreca 03 Nissan.
The qualifying saw a bit changed strategy in the Peugeot camp after completely wrong Spa performance when all cars had to start from the middle to back of the grid after the session was halted too early due to accident followed by a red flag and Peugeots waiting for the final part of the qualifying session. This time Peugeot took one car at the beginning of the session to challenge the Audis directly while the other was running after several minutes. When Audis stopped it was Peugeot-Audi-Peugeot-Audi and this remained unchanged until end of the session. The difference between them was 1.2 seconds. Another 1.8 seconds back was the best of the rest, OAK Pescarolo LMP1 no.15 followed by two Rebellion Lolas and the factory Pescarolo, which still uses an old 2010 engine and is slightly outpaced, similarly as Oreca Peugeot is slower compared to 2011 diesel powered cars. However the Oreca Peugeot was surprisingly withdrawn before the meeting. The official reason was the need of car rebuild after the Le Mans race.
The LMP2 grid was headed by TDS Racing who was now able to beat Boutsen Energy Racing Oreca. Strakka Racing HPD was third. The two BMW M3's headed the GT grid but were closely followed by several new Ferrari 458 Italias. Both Lotus Evoras were still the slowest car on the grid, though not starting from the real back as several cars were moved to the rear for various reasons.
The race was started exactly at noon on Sunday. Early in the race the positions were the as as on the grid, i.e. Peugeot number 1 followed by Audi no.1, Peugeot no.8 and Audi no.2. But at the end of the first hour the two Peugeots were already in the lead and it seemed that the Audi are losing breath though by this time Peugeot no.2 and Audi no.1 were still in a close touch. Further back were both golden Rebellion Lolas in a fight with the lone OAK LMP1 Pescarolo no.15. Factory Pescarolo no.16 was running next with no signs of having the performance of previous three petrol cars. Before suffering problems during the second hours, the last LMP1 car in the field easily had ninth spot ahead of the LMP2 field. This was dominated by Orecas 03 Nissan, though one of them, the Boutsen Energy no.45 was delayed after spinning early in the race. Some good showing was also seen from both OAK LMP2 Pescarolos, Greaves Zytek and the Strakka Racing HPD. The GT class was easily dominated by both BMW M3's ahead of the new Ferraris 458 Italias.
There were also several cars suffering big problems in the first hour. Luxury Racing Ferrari no.49 managed to complete only a single lap after 43 minutes and was retired. Both Lotus Evoras were also early retirements. RLR Msport MG Lola was still in the pits after only two completed laps. The car later returned to the race with a huge delay but did not finish anyway.
After two hours of racing we had shortly Peugeot no.8 in the lead closely followed by Peugeot no.7. The change was caused by the pit stops but no.7 moved to the front soon. But Audis were now 20 and 52 seconds behind the leading Peugeot respectively. It already looked that in terms of speed the Audis are not able to keep in touch with Peugeots anymore. It was confirmed in the next hour when the Audi no.2 was even lapped by both Peugeots. Behind the four big factory cars, we had still both Rebellion Lolas, now three laps behind the leaders, but the OAK car had big troubles and was classified only 42nd in the middle of the race. So the 7th position overall was inherited by the factory Pescarolo ahead of two Oreca-Nissans and the final LMP1 car, the Zytek of MIK Course. In the GT class we had BMW's first and third with the Ferraris 458 filling the rest of the top five GT positions.
During the fourth hour the other Audi was also lapped by both Peugeots and it was clear that unless both Peugeots got in troubles, there is no chance for Audi winning the race. The differences among the top four cars were now bigger and changes in positions happened only during the pit stops. After two thirds of the race the Peugeot no.7 driven by Bourdais/Davidson led by 45 seconds over their team mates Montagny/Sarrazin in no.8. Audi no.1 with Bernhard/Fässler at the wheel was one lap and 7 seconds further back and the remaining factory diesel squad Kristensen/McNish in no.2 was exactly another lap behind the no.1. Factory Pescarolo no.16 was now best of the rest running 5 laps behind the leader but was closely followed by both Rebellion Lolas. Eighth position belonged to the LMP2 leaders Beche/Thiriet/Firth still in an Oreca 03 Nissan (no.46) but it was followed by two different cars: Zytek no.41 and Lola Spyder of Level 5 Motorsport. Since the Oreca no.46 was going to hit trouble in the next hour the other two LMP2 had a fight for the class win in prospect. The GT class was still BMW-Ferrari-BMW-Ferrari but behind them was now the best Porsche.
Nothing had changed among the top 4 positions in the final hour, just Audi no.2 managed to unlap itself. The factory Pescarolo hit troubles in the final hour but did not lose positions just about five laps as it had been already behind the Rebellion Lolas before. The MIK Corse Zytek disappeared from the top during the fifth hour and 30 minutes before the finished was abandoned completely.
The final stages of the LMP2 battles was rather interesting and surprising when the Level 5 Motorsport Lola appeared in the lead in the final hour and when it looked that Bouchut can take it through the finish to the victory but in the last 30 minutes the car start running slowly. Couple of pit stops did not help to fix the problem so Bouchut was ciculating slower but still in decent tempo. The car lied in the third position behind leader Zytek which was several laps ahead of Signatech Nissan team Oreca 03 but Bouchut had to defend position ahead of similar Lola Spyder, which was in the same lap. RUnning about only 10 second slower he managed to keep the podium finish until the end but should the race finish a lap later both Lola Spyders would be very close together.
In the GT class the two BMW's faded away, one car nearly finishing last and the other at least maintained the podium finish behind two Ferraris 458, both AF Corse team, drivers Melo/Vilander and Fisichella/Bruni. There was also an amateur part of the GT classification and it was won by IMSA Performance Porsche 997 GT3 RSR, at least one win for the manufacturer which is going to return in a full force factory team in 2014 to challenge Peugeots and Audis in the new FIA World Endurance Championship.
It is also interesting to compare number and percentage of finishers at this year's Imola race to its earlier editions. This year out of 48 cars, we had 39 finishers, which is over 81% ratio. In 1984 it was 15 cars out of 27, i.e. 56%. A year before, 14 out of 22 (64%), so a big improvement in reliability since the early Group C days. However in 1974 when the field was much stronger (38 cars), only 34% (13 cars) made it to the finish. So the improvement of reliability in endurance racing over the decades is evident and worth to mention.
