4x R8-LMS for the Nürburgring 24h on Saturday - 6SpeedOnline

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06-23-2011 | 01:20 PM

catchmyshadow

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4x R8-LMS for the Nürburgring 24h on Saturday

Audi sets its sights on overall victory in yet another endurance classic only two weeks after the tenth 24 Hours of Le Mans
victory: the Audi Sport Teams Abt Sportsline and Phoenix, known from the DTM, will compete with four Audi R8 LMS in the
24-hour race around the famous Nürburgring-Nordschleife on June 25/26.

Audi supplies, through its sporting subsidiary quattro GmbH, the official cars since 2002 for the popular event in the Eifel
which attracts more than 200,000 spectators every year. However, only once Audi has sent a factory squad into the “Green
Hell”: In 2004 Audi competed with two modified DTM cars based on the Abt-Audi TT-R which finished fourth and eighth.
In 2011 the team around Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich makes a second attempt with the Audi R8 LMS.

The fascinating GT3 sportscar is the first race car of the brand with the Four Rings that was specifically developed for
customer racing and which is now fielded successfully by customer teams throughout the world. The R8 LMS powered by a
near standard production V10 engine has already claimed 83 wins. More wins are added almost every weekend – at the
beginning of 2011 this included victory in the 12-hour race at Bathurst in Australia.

The R8 LMS has already proved its qualities around the world’s toughest, and at 25.378 kilometers, the world’s longest track:
the customer car has recorded two overall victories in the VLN endurance championship at the Nürburgring to date – most
recently 14 days before the 24-hour race in its final test race.

Its record in the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring is also impressive: with factory support from Ingolstadt and Neckarsulm in
2009 and 2010 the ABT Sportsline and Phoenix Racing teams each took victory in the SP9 class for GT3 cars. In 2009 Christian
Abt, Jean-François Hemroulle, Pierre Kaffer and Lucas Luhr took second place overall on the R8 LMS sports car’s debut
24-hour race. Marc Bronzel, Luca Ludwig, Dennis Rostek and Markus Winkelhock raised a few eyebrows with their third
position overall last year.

The goals are now set considerably higher: against the strongest of competition with cars from the brands BMW, Ferrari,
Lamborghini, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche and Volkswagen, Audi aims to win the 39th running of the endurance classic and in
doing so have its name etched for the first time on the winner’s trophy and promote both the Audi R8 in general and the Audi
R8 LMS specifically.

To achieve this ambitious goal nothing has been left to chance over the last few months. Various details of the R8 LMS were
improved with a view to the Nordschleife races. In addition to pure performance the greatest attention was placed on
reliability, which was checked in two 30-hour tests. To this end Audi used the tests scheduled for the Le Mans winning Audi
R18 TDI in order to complete the endurance runs simultaneously.

This is not the only parallel between the Le Mans winning car and the R8 LMS: just like at Le Mans the Audi GT3 sportscar
runs on Michelin tires in the Eifel. And exactly like at Le Mans, ultra-lightweight design and construction, an area of core
expertise for AUDI AG, also plays an important role at the Nürburgring-Nordschleife. The Audi R8 LMS has a particularly light
and strong aluminum chassis in Audi Space Frame (ASF) technology and a bodywork partly made from carbon fiber.

Audi sets standards in safety

During the GT3 sportscar’s concept and design stage Audi already attached great value to maximum safety. The unique
safety concept of the Audi R8 LMS with the fully functional standard Audi Space Frame crash structures including the
side-impact protection, the sophisticated steel roll-cage and the ‘splash-free’ refueling system were complemented by
another aspect in 2011.

Audi designed an innovative seat system to comply with the latest FIA regulations. It is the follow-up model to the seat
system previously manufactured by suppliers. A modular manufacturing concept facilitates manufacture with far greater
possibilities for individualization. The conventional seat shells of specialist suppliers were previously designed to a standard
width; Audi can now offer and manufacture different seat widths. As a result, internationally active drivers can now make a
selection optimized to suit their needs.

The seat is manufactured entirely from carbon-fiber, has a dual shell construction and therefore complies with the most
demanding load cases. At the same time the already known longitudinal adjustability of the seat remains. Teams with drivers
of differing stature can therefore achieve an ideal and safe seating position for each driver without losing time during driver
changes. As a result, drivers of the Audi R8 LMS enjoy an advantage over the competition relying on seat box systems
without longitudinal adjustment. Since the installation height of the seat allows the driver position to be lowered by around 60
mm the overall center of gravity also benefits from the new solution. This new seat system will be available in the future to
all Audi Sport customer teams.

High-caliber driver squad

The driver squad, which Audi assembles for the 24-hour race at the Nürburgring, could hardly be more high-caliber. DTM
stars like Mattias Ekström and Timo Scheider share driving duties with Le Mans winners like Marcel Fässler and Marco Werner
and acknowledged Nordschleife specialists like Marc Basseng or Frank Stippler. Mike Rockenfeller, who is still recovering from
the aftereffects of his severe accident during the 24 Hours of Le Mans, will not participate.

some Audi R8 LMS impressions from their training sessions:

for those, who want to follow the live action on saturday at 4pm CET,
here are some live streams:

http://adac.24h-rennen.de/Live-Streaming-2011.4101.0.html

http://tv.audi.de/#/01

http://www.sportauto-online.de/news/live-stream-vom-24h-rennen-2011-nuerburgring-1051488.html

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Last edited by catchmyshadow; 06-23-2011 at 01:28 PM.

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