And although I haven’t watched the first 3hrs of this years 24 Heurs du Mans. (Video tape #47 of this past weekend) I have managed to watch a significant chunk of SPEED’s “Mega” 17.5 hours of coverage. I mean what better way to cure insomnia than sitting glued to the TV into the wee hours of the morning watching Le Mans? As ironically the world feed shows nothing more than the front straight and pits during the night hours of the race. This is because the French TV crews DON’T work thru the night, opting to get some sleep instead…
And I found it fascinating as I seemed to tune in when the action got crazy. Like the leading Audi R10 being 3 laps ahead of the field when the right rear tire decided to depart the race car… This was 54 minutes into the R10 TDI’s run. And although Audi claimed it had nothing to do with the car being dropped without the wheel being fastened. Apparently it was some type of spindle failure. As birthday boy Dindo Capello was distraught after careening into the tire barrier. Yes, it was Capello’s 43rd birthday and I’m sure it’s NOT what he wished for!
Or Johnny Herbert going off track while leading GT1 in the Aston Martin DBR9. Yet apparently Tomas Enge also got a bit too carried away and put the same #007 leading DBR9 off track later in the race.
Or how about the window falling out of the leading Risi Competizone Ferrari F430GT. Yet I missed the part when 5 cars went off due to oil being down…
Or the abysmal weather conditions for the final 2hrs which saw torrential downpour. Where leading Audi R10 driver Marco Werner was seen shaking his head in disbelief over the conditions he was being forced to drive in. This was upon Werner dropping his lap times into the 6 minute range in order to keep the invincible Audi “On the Island.” Compare this to the record lap times Allan McNish was setting aboard a sister car of 3:27 in the dry!
Yet I have to say I think the new Peugeot 908 is an awesome looking chassis. And I like it a ton more than the austere Audi R8/R10 TDi’s. So it’s great news that the ACO will require a return to closed top coupes beginning in 2010 for the prototype ranks. Which I assume that the America Le Mans Series will follow suit? And I’m sure that these chassis will be way better looking than the UGLY DP Prototypes.
And I was so DAMM happy to see the Aston Martin DBR9 BEAT the Corvette! As I really tire of the Chevrolet bias of the broadcaster’s towards the GM make. So it was quite pleasing to see the lone Corvette as the meat in the Aston Martin sandwich! Along with David Richards mug on TV after taking a glug ‘O champagne upon the DBR9 breaking its Le Mans Duck! Especially since this was Prodrive’s first major race outing since David Richards & Co. bought Aston Martin from Ford.
And I find it a bit funny, but I found the 24 Heurs du Mans TV coverage far MORE Exhilarating than FOX’s pathetic USGP coverage. For that part I found the Sports Car classic far more intriguing to watch then the Formula 1 race!
Race Report
