SEBRING, FL — Audi will introduce its new R-15 chassis at the prestigous 12 Hours of Sebring where fans of endurance racing will get a preview of the battle that will take place the storied 24 Hours of Le Mans three months later.

How will the new Audi R-15 differ from the orignal TDI car.

Audi won the battle with Peugeot last year — but it was clear that the Peugeot was faster — faster in qualifying and faster during the race until the rain came.

Up and until the rain began the Peugeot was significantly faster — running laps that were faster in the race than the Audi was able to run during qualifications. It was a major wake-up call for the Audi team and it begat the the R-15 for which there has been significant interest but very little information.

From one site comes this image of the new R-15. 

The car was caught testing at Vallelunga, Spain.

Head of Audi Motorsport Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich said of the new race car: “So far the R15 TDI has performed as we expected. Now it must also prove itself in race conditions. Sebring is a particularly hard race and is therefore perfectly suited to reveal even the smallest of weaknesses.”

Allan McNish, who is one of the drivers to have tested the car said: “I drove it for the first time before Christmas as planned in Spain and everything went well. Since then Audi Sport has been busy with extensive testing and everything is progressing very well and on schedule – it’s a tremendous car.

“I have been in the Audi ‘family’ for a few years now and have confidence that the team in Ingolstadt have again designed and built us a worthy successor to the R10 TDI,” McNish said..

Audi Sport Team Joest has also confirmed their driver line-ups for Sebring with McNish sharing one car with his usual partners Rinaldo Capello and eight-time Le Mans winner Tom Kristensen, and the second machine piloted by Germans Lucas Luhr, Mike Rockenfeller and Marco Werner.