Pagenaud and Ferran victorious

The American Le Mans Series races follow one another and have been similar for several months. After the initial round, the 12 Hours of Sebring, where Audi and Peugeot had arranged to meet to prepare the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Acura ARX 02a took over. And, if David Brabham and Scott Sharp still occupy first place in the LM P1 ranking, they owe it to their consistency, but simon pagenaud and Gil de Ferran have taken the advantage for several races. The Franco-Brazilian crew thus won their fourth consecutive event.

If the Frenchman Simon Pagenaud greatly contributed to the crew's victory, by having an excellent first part of the race, Gil de Ferran also stood out. By winning pole on Friday - taking the opportunity to announce his retirement at the end of the season - the Brazilian had already done most of the work. And, at the end of the race, he was able to resist the return of David Brabham and impose his Acura for the fourth time this season.

Simon Pagenaud launched it in the best conditions. After the yellow flag period at the start of the race, the Frenchman quickly widened the gap on Scott Sharp. After 77 minutes and 50 covered laps, the Poitevin driver was able to hand over the wheel to Gil de Ferran while never having lost the lead, Scott Sharp having stopped three laps earlier to hand over to David Brabham.

A second yellow flag period after 80 laps of the race reduced the gap between the two Acuras to zero. David Brabham joined Gil de Ferran and the suspense was reignited. But as soon as the green flag appeared, the Brazilian took off again, to increase his lead to thirteen seconds, twenty laps from the end. If Brabham and de Ferran slammed the times as the end of the race approached, they were unable to erase that of Simon Pagenaud (1?11??105), achieved on the 47th lap.

After 2h45 of racing, Gil de Ferran crossed the finish line as winner, more than eight seconds ahead of David Brabham. The Brazilian, who saw his engineer in charge of refueling seriously injured at Mid-Ohio last year, could not contain his emotion at the end of the race. “ What happened last year was a big turning point for the team and myself, he said upon arrival. But you can't be successful if you don't have the ideas in place. You must therefore keep your emotions in check and be 100% rational. It was my most emotional race. »

As for Simon Pagenaud, he adds one more victory to his purse. The Frenchman, by stringing together fast times and widening a significant gap during the first half of the event, proved that he was trustworthy. And, obviously, the Poitevin was happy at the end of the race. “ We had a good weekend “, said Pagenaud, who set the fastest lap in the race for the third time this season. “ The crew made the right decisions at the right time. During my stint, we had to save a lot of fuel. It?s good to be able to see an improvement over the year. It was a pleasant race to compete in. »

En GT2, Corvette a failli faire un énorme coup pour la première course des C6.R dans la catégorie. Mais la Porsche 997 du Flying Lizard Motorsports a connu une stratégie payante. En choisissant de n?effectuer qu?un seul arrêt, au lieu de deux pour les Corvette, l?équipe a ainsi permis à Patrick Long et Jorg Bergmeister d?entrevoir la victoire, leur cinquième succès de la saison en GT2. Le pari était risqué puisqu?à deux tours de l?arrivée, Patrick Long touchait aux réserves de carburant. Mais le pari était gagné, pour un équipage qui file tout droit vers le titre de vainqueur de l?ALMS en GT2.