Going for the Double
July 30, 2008
The DBR9 once again showed the Corvettes the way home at Le Mans last month, so Aston is now targeting Audi and Peugeot...
'Write hilarious 'clean me' gags, below'
Do take five minutes to read this story. And read it with your fingers crossed. If what it contains comes to pass, then don't book anything in for the middle weekend of June 2010, because you'll want to be with me, watching Aston Martin and Jaguar compete for overall victory at the Le Mans 24 Hour. I'm deadly serious. Read on.Things happen at 5.00am in the morning at Le Mans; a moment, remember, only just the right side of the continental divide that separates the optimism of the first 12 and the anxiety of the last 12 hours of world's greatest motor race.
David Richards is explaining just what happened to the 007 Gulf Racing Aston Martin DBR9
(referred to as the 'double-oh seven car' inside AM Racing). "24-hour racing is the ultimate lottery; the remaining great challenge. You just can't prepare for every eventuality with a race that only happens once a year. You can do as many race simulations as you want, but you can't cover for human failure."It was Andrea's [driver Andrea Piccini, the old hand in the 'fresher's team' car with ex-F1 drivers Heinz-Harald Frentzen and Karl Wendlinger] error that caused the off, and hit the stones that knocked off the alternator belt." Richards, Chairman of Aston since last year, has been the boss of AMR since the DBR9s first wailed around Le Mans four years ago.
>'24-hour racing is the ultimate lottery; the remaining great challenge.'
"When the car came in with the flat battery, we quickly charged that on the stand, but the driver had his foot on the clutch, and the alternator drives off the gearbox, so it appeared the battery wasn't charging. We changed the alternator, it cost the car two laps. We didn't need to, but that's the kind of mistake you make at five o'clock in the morning."
The flip side of that is the peformance of the 'senior team' in the 009 car you see here, shot exclusively for Top Gear, still wearing the grime
of its second consecutive victory over the bullish 'Team America' Corvettes. A great racing team,
any great racing team, is built not
around the team principle but around its drivers, suggests Richards, who is, er, team principal at Aston Martin Racing.
The faultless performance of the winning crew would tend to suggest he's right. Never less than absolutely on-it for 24 hours (the Vette was less than a lap behind), the car went as well in the pits as it did on the track. Look closely at the pics - beyond the oil and rubber and rainwater, there's not a scratch on the winning DBR9.
That was all David Richards answering the question, which I paraphrase now a little, 'How the hell did Peugeot spend all that money, build a car that fast and still not win?' His answer, typically candid, typically straight, typically warmly expressed, is all based around his theory
that at Le Mans it's all about the people, not about the cars; you can prep the cars to a level beyond the obsessive, but you can't make human beings think straight.
The flip side of that is the peformance of the 'senior team' in the 009 car you see here, shot exclusively for Top Gear, still wearing the grime
of its second consecutive victory over the bullish 'Team America' Corvettes. A great racing team,
any great racing team, is built not
around the team principle but around its drivers, suggests Richards, who is, er, team principal at Aston Martin Racing.The faultless performance of the winning crew would tend to suggest he's right. Never less than absolutely on-it for 24 hours (the Vette was less than a lap behind), the car went as well in the pits as it did on the track. Look closely at the pics - beyond the oil and rubber and rainwater, there's not a scratch on the winning DBR9.
That was all David Richards answering the question, which I paraphrase now a little, 'How the hell did Peugeot spend all that money, build a car that fast and still not win?' His answer, typically candid, typically straight, typically warmly expressed, is all based around his theory
that at Le Mans it's all about the people, not about the cars; you can prep the cars to a level beyond the obsessive, but you can't make human beings think straight.Things happen at five in the morning at Le Mans. Execs make mistakes too; let their guards down, say things their PR's need to 'clarify' later, which is how we came to find out just exactly what's going on at Aston Martin Racing and at Jaguar.
Aston first. You'll notice another car in the pictures. It's not pretty, but it is effective. It's an LMP1 car, the same class as the winning Audis
 and losing Peuegot diesels (and let's face it, the
908s should have won, but didn't for all the reasons Richards made clear). Only it's not a
diesel, and is instead powered by the same six-litre V12 engine that powers the DBR and indeed the DB9. Sort of.
In the LMP1 car, thanks to a large air intake,
it produces an extra 50bhp, around 650bhp, under
a new rule implemented this year by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest, who so jealously guard their 24-hour race. It cops a lot of flak, but Richards sees
it as no more demanding than the NASCAR authorities, loathed by purists but custodians of the world's most successful series outside of F1.
Aston first. You'll notice another car in the pictures. It's not pretty, but it is effective. It's an LMP1 car, the same class as the winning Audis
 and losing Peuegot diesels (and let's face it, the
908s should have won, but didn't for all the reasons Richards made clear). Only it's not a
diesel, and is instead powered by the same six-litre V12 engine that powers the DBR and indeed the DB9. Sort of.In the LMP1 car, thanks to a large air intake,
it produces an extra 50bhp, around 650bhp, under
a new rule implemented this year by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest, who so jealously guard their 24-hour race. It cops a lot of flak, but Richards sees
it as no more demanding than the NASCAR authorities, loathed by purists but custodians of the world's most successful series outside of F1.
>'So the ACO needs to decide how much it wants Peugeot 
to win for 'la gloire de la France'.'
The rule change worked well for Aston Martin - behind the diesels, the LMP1 was the fastest car in the field. And there's the first problem with Aston Martin elevating the programme from semi-works (the LMP1 car is a Lola chassis run by Czech former racer, Antonin "Tony" Charouz); Aston Martin could not race a diesel car. It just couldn't. So the ACO needs to decide how much it wants Peugeot 
to win for 'la gloire de la France'. If it further limits the all-conquering diesels next year, then the 'works' Aston LMP1 moves closer...
But that's not the only problem. As we've said,
the Charouz ain't pretty, and an Aston Martin LMP1 car would need to take your breath away, which is why the still-secret prototype has been designed by Marek Reichman, the same suave Brit who designs Aston's road cars. His prototype is currently residing with the race team, which is now testing whether the car can be simultaneously pretty and aerodynamically efficient.
Then there's the cash, about $30million. Now Richards is creative when it comes to raising money to go racing; the DBR9s, for example, were pre-sold to collectors to pay for the programme. There's a futures market in DBRs with racing provenance, with the last contract sold for over $1million.
A decision needs to be made by September and, even with allowances for Richards's singular brand
of cool, he seems agnostic. He recognises that Aston's relationship with Le Mans is less intense than Jaguar - it did, after all, kind of luck in to the 1959 win. "No," he says, "we have to be in the proposed 2010 GT world championships, racing against Porsche 
and Ferrari and Lamborghini and the Audi R8. Although I don't see why I should loan Aston's credibility and provenance to Nissan and Toyota. Jaguar, however, have to be at Le Mans."
But that's not the only problem. As we've said,
the Charouz ain't pretty, and an Aston Martin LMP1 car would need to take your breath away, which is why the still-secret prototype has been designed by Marek Reichman, the same suave Brit who designs Aston's road cars. His prototype is currently residing with the race team, which is now testing whether the car can be simultaneously pretty and aerodynamically efficient.
Then there's the cash, about $30million. Now Richards is creative when it comes to raising money to go racing; the DBR9s, for example, were pre-sold to collectors to pay for the programme. There's a futures market in DBRs with racing provenance, with the last contract sold for over $1million.
A decision needs to be made by September and, even with allowances for Richards's singular brand
of cool, he seems agnostic. He recognises that Aston's relationship with Le Mans is less intense than Jaguar - it did, after all, kind of luck in to the 1959 win. "No," he says, "we have to be in the proposed 2010 GT world championships, racing against Porsche 
and Ferrari and Lamborghini and the Audi R8. Although I don't see why I should loan Aston's credibility and provenance to Nissan and Toyota. Jaguar, however, have to be at Le Mans."
>'There's a futures market in DBRs with racing provenance, with the last contract sold for over $1million'
Jaguar. OK, rules for-off-the-record conversations - especially 5.00am ones - with Chairmen, CEOs, MDs or anyone who gets to sign off a bill that runs well into seven figures are rather like privy counsel conversations; they never actually happened.
But I can tell you this with absolute certainty - Jaguar wants to do an LMP programme and go for an eighth win (to match Audi) in 2010. Ask Jaguar MD Mike O'Driscoll to confirm, and he'll
 confirm the will, if not exactly the intent. You can understand why he needs to be cagey; it's not just
the new management he doesn't want to surprise, but a not inconsiderable constituency of fans.
But considering that Jaguar moved back in to profit the month after the Indians took over, his thinking doesn't sound unreasonable. So 12/13
June 2010. Can we call it a date?
But considering that Jaguar moved back in to profit the month after the Indians took over, his thinking doesn't sound unreasonable. So 12/13
June 2010. Can we call it a date?
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