ALMS

LAKEVILLE, CT — Rob Dyson’s Lola B12/60 Mazda LMP1 won the battle, but it was the Muscle Milk HPD ARX-03a Honda of Lucas Luhr and Klaus Graph that won the war at the Lime Rock American Le Mans series Northwest Grand Prix, as they came from four laps down during the race for the victory.

Rob Smith finished qualifying with an equally entertaining top lap and pole position for the Mazda, out dueling the Honda  by a mere .102 seconds. On race day when electrical issues plaqued the Muscle Milk sponsored Honda, it appeared as if the race was Smith and Dyson’s to lose.

Unfortunately for the Mazda team, on their “home track” (Poukeepsie, NY is home base) they did lose the race to a hard charging bonzai performance by Lurh and Graph that earned for them a nearly 13 second victory over their chief rivals, their third straight in the ALMS this year.

P2 class honors went to Level 5’s Christophe Bouchut and Scott Tucker, who led outright for more than 30 minutes and held off a hard-charging Conquest Endurance Morgan-Nissan of Martin Plowman for the class win.

“Dr. Mc Dreamy”, Patrick Dempsey, scored his first ALMS podium finish, teaming with Joe Foster in the No. 27 Dempsey Racing Lola B12/80 Judd to finish third in class.

In the GT catagorie, it was another dog fight to the finish with Jörg Bergmeister and Patrick Long earning victory for Flying Lizard Motorsports in a fantastic fight with Corvette Racing and Extreme Speed Motorsports. Bergmeister celebrated his 100th ALMS start with his sixth win in seven Lime Rock races. Bergmeister held off a stern challenge from a pair of Corvette C6 ZR1s.

SEBRING, FL — Test day is complete and all that is left is waiting for the green flag to drop for the 60th running of the 12 Hours of Sebring, this year the kick-off event for the World Endurance Championship.

While there are perceived winners and losers at test day — the times don’t really mean much to anyone since between the the time that test day is run and the green flag drops the track will most likely change at least three times. It will be up to drivers and crews to dial the cars in during speed week.

However, the winner of the test day sessions was Lucas Luhr and the Muscle Milk Pickett Race team. This year the team is running a brand new Honda HPD ARX 03a that had not turned a lap in anger until this session. Luhr’s lap that clocked in at just over 123 mph to top all at the test session. The Audi team was not at the test session nor were any of the other LMP1 teams that are expected to contest the race at Sebring. Most notably missing from the test date is the Peugeot team that quit the series as of mid-February.

One thing that is known is that the Audi team will be bringing two cars the former WWII airfield while Peugeot flicked in at least the next two seasons and their only other competition — competition meaning a manufacturer who can spend euros at the same rate as Audi is the Toyota Team, which will not join the circuit until after the initial race of the series at Sebring. That leaves the Honda the Muscle Milk Picket Racing team to rub a little paint with the Audi team.