A FOURTH WIN TO FINISH WITH
L
a g u n a S e c a
It's
been tradition now for several years that the American Le Mans Series rounds
off its year at Laguna Seca. One last opportunity for Romain Dumas to shine
and to end in style a season full of many good performances but also notable
for some hard knocks. On the short and tortuous circuit in Monterey, California,
many believed that the Porsche RS Spyders would be at an advantage over the
LMP1 cars. But from there to think that they would be on an equal footing, was
quite a step. However, from the first moments of free practice Romain showed
this was possible by setting the fastest overall lap time even ahead of the
Audi R10's and other LMP1 entries. It was not really surprising as the Porsche's
impressive road-holding was generally held to suit the more sinuous tracks and
perform better at the restarts and in mid-speed corners. In the following sessions,
the Audis regained the upper hand but Romain continued to top the LMP2 time
sheets. In official qualifying, a front suspension element worked loose and
obviously upset the balance on the N° 7 yellow prototype and Romain had to be
content with only sixth fastest time. "It
was a great disappointment because I was hoping to set my fifth pole in five
sessions" said the French driver, who
luckily would be able to make up the time in the race.
The four-hour
race started well for Romain. He first of all overtook Weaver and Maassen and
was then able to stay on the tails of the LMP1 cars, until the first deployment
of the Safety Car after about 30 minutes. So the team decided to refuel and
change their race strategy. As a consequence, as the other cars stopped, Romain
crept up the leader board until he found himself actually in the lead! A lead
the driver from the Gard region of France kept for about 20 laps, with a lead
hovering around the 15 second mark. At just about the halfway point of the race,
Romain pitted to hand over to his co-driver, Lucas Luhr. Unluckily the Safety
Car appeared for second time while Lucas was driving and the N° 7 Porsche's
advantage was reduced to nothing! Just 35 minutes from the chequered flag, Lucas
unfortunately made a mistake as he was trying to keep the Audis behind him and
had a spin which cost him some 20 seconds. "He
was doing his utmost to catch up with McNish's Audi and I don't hold anything
against him, as our win in LMP2 was assured".
Minassian also took advantage and overtook to secure the last step on the podium.
Despite this upset, Luhr and Dumas took the LMP2 class win.
"Four
wins, four pole positions, four fastest laps – that's as good a record as Timo
Bernhard who headed the LMP2 class points for most of the season. It's a consolation
even if it can never replace a title"
was Romain's summing up of the year. "We
won the driver's championship, the team championship, the manufacturer's and
the engine builder's titles for Porsche and for Penske – how could you not be
happy with results like that? This first season with the Porsche RS Spyder and
of course the whole Penske team has been full of new experiences and good memories. The high point will be the win at Mid-Ohio against the Audis but also
I will remember all the races when we battling with the LMP1 class cars and
we had great fun competing with them".Romain DUMAS