ALMS

SEBRING, Fl — With four hours complete in the 58th annual Mobil 1 GTwelve Hours of Sebring, it is still the No.08 Peugeot (Lamy/ Bourdais/ Minassian) in the lead with the No. 7 Peugeot in second eight-and-a-half seconds off the pace. The two Peugeots are currently the only two cars that are on the same lap with the Aston Martin (Primat/ Mucke/ Fernandez) on lap down in third place.

Team Drayson, which had been running as high as second place behind the No. 08 Peugeot, has had a session in the pits for what has been termed “Percussive Maintenance” (meaning they are beating the living hell out of the car to make it perform better). The No. 45 Porsche GT3 (Bergmeisgter/ Lieb/ Long) is in third and the No. 90 BMW that started from the pits has moved to fourth overall in the GT2 class.

All four of these GT2 cars are on the same lap, 13 laps down to the leaders.

The LMP2 results have not changed, although the Acura now has a two lap lead on the Porsche.

GT2 continues to be a downright throwdown. The No. 62 Ferarri 430 GT (Melo/ Kaffer/ Bruni) has taken its turn at the front of the4 pack and is followed by the No. 92 E92 M3 BMW (Auberlen / Werner/ Milner).

Results after four hours:
(1) #07-P1 Anthony Davidson (Peugeot 908 HDI FAP) 122 laps (0.000-)
(2) #08-P1 Nicolas Minassian (Peugeot 908 HDI FAP) 122 laps (47.653-)
(3) #007-P1 Harold Primat (Lola B09 60/Aston Martin) 121 laps (-1 Laps)
(4) #1-P2 David Brabham (HPD ARX-01c) 119 laps (-3 Laps)
(5) #6-P2 Sascha Maassen (Porsche RS Spyder) 117 laps (-5 Laps)
(31) #16-P2 Andy Meyrick (Lola B09 86/Mazda) 78 laps (-44 Laps)
(7) #55-LMPC Mark Wilkins (Oreca FLM09) 110 laps (-12 Laps)
(12) #36-LMPC Tom Sutherland (Oreca FLM09) 108 laps (-14 Laps)
(18) #99-LMPC Elton Julian (Oreca FLM09) 105 laps (-17 Laps)
(8) #62-GT2 Gianmaria Bruni (Ferrari 430 GT) 109 laps (-13 Laps)
(9) #92-GT2 Dirk Werner (BMW E92 M3) 109 laps (-13 Laps)
(10) #45-GT2 Jorg Bergmeister (Porsche 911 GT3 RSR) 109 laps (-13 Laps)
(20) #81-GTC Butch Leitzinger (Porsche 911 GT3 Cup) 102 laps (-20 Laps)
(21) #23-GTC Sweedler/Kapudija/Lueders (Porsche 911 GT3 Cup) 102 laps (-20 Laps)
(22) #63-GTC Duncan Ende (Porsche 911 GT3 Cup) 101 laps (-21 Laps)

Peugeot takes lead in the first turn.

SEBRING, Fl — As expected that No. 08 Peugeot (Lamy/Bordais/Minassian) jumped into the lead at the start of the 58th running of the Mobil 1 Twelve Hours of Sebring presented by Fresh From Florida. What is a surprise is that the Drayson Lola Judd with Emmanuel Pirro at the wheel clawed his was into second place and at the end of the first hour was only 1.7 seconds off the pace set by the French Lion.

Using traffic to his advantage, Pirro , the former Audi works driver, used the ferocious GT2 battle to get round the Peugeot and into second place. Pirro’s experience is showing in the performance of the car and it will be interesting to see how the young Jony Cocker does in his turn along with car owner Paul Drayson. One ace up the Drayson team’s sleeve is Team Manager Dale White who has won the Sebring event on three other occasion in the GT2 class.

The second Peugeot is in third and the Aston Martin is off the pace about 18 second behind the leading Peugeot.

In LMP2 it is the Patron sponsored Acura (Brabham/Pagenaud/Franchitti) with a small lead over the Porsche R8 Spyder.

GT2 is the battle royale that was expected, as the CorvetteC6 R (Magnussen/O’Connell/ Garcia) have a sliver of lead over the Flying Lizards Porsche 911 GT3 (Bergmeister/ Lieb/ Long). The second Vette (Beretta/ Gavin/ Collard) is in third place a little more than a half second back.

There are a passle of other GT2s following closely behind.

Race day morning

The calm before the storm: the Sebring pits at 7 am.

SEBRING, Fl — After a week of testing teams will get down to business when the green flag drops today at 11 am EDT.

One team that has had a reversal of fortunes is the No. 90 BMW that earned the pole in the GT2 class yesterday but was subsequently moved to the back of the grid when it failed the stall test. That moved the Flying Lizards No. 45 Porsche 911 GT3  into the pole position of the GT2 class, driver Jorg Bergmeister’s first at Sebring.

Adding insult to industry, the 90 BMW with Joey Hand at the wheel spun coming out of the last turn and impacted tire wall on the passenger side of the car. They will start from the pits as the team does not believe they can get the car repaired in time for the start.

On the weather front, the morning dawned clear and the prediction is for temperatures reaching the mid to high 70s, in contrast to a very cool week during testing.