2011 24 Heures du Mans - 79th Grand Prix d'Endurance, June 11-12 - Race Week Thread

A car width makes a difference when the track 3 car widths wide, not to mention a slight off camber crest towards the apex. It's not a problem of absolute grip so much as the car being unsettled. You may consider yourself far more of a driving expert but i've driven the corner myself at 'legal' speeds and I don't think its the cake walk you're making it out to be, at least not at 200mph at night. I can see we're just going to have to disagree on this.

As Martin pointed out, all the other GT drivers were running wide with no problems. Nothing is a cake walk in motorsport. Just varying degrees of difficulty. But if the rest of the field were doing it fine then it stands to reason Kaufman could do it too. If not, then the mere fact he was sharing the track is a travesty of professionalism, as many drivers are alluding to in their comments about the Am class. But I'm sure he was capable of doing it, amateur or not, he does have at least some experience.

I'm merely reporting what the ACO stated in the drivers brief, you can rage all you want but i'm really not bothered.

ACO says "hold the racing line"*. Driver holds racing line. Driver causes overtaking car to go into the grass and crash. ACO excludes driver.

Show me the logic.

You've also mistaken rage for mirth.

*Waltrip wrote in a blog for USA Today that they were told:

We're running in the GTE division, and it can be very hard to stay out of the way of the prototype cars in the premier class. They tell you, "Hold your line, and they'll go around you," but one mistake can end your race. They're so much faster than the GTE cars. I know they're not supposed to run over me, but I need to do whatever I can to make sure I don't get run over. That means giving them the room to go. It's like a Formula One car catching you. The tricky part is you can't see well out of the car. You see lights behind you, and if it's a prototype, they consume you in seconds. Two-time Le Mans champion Allan McNish said the prototype drivers will commit a couple hundred yards before reaching a GT car. They lap 40 seconds quicker than us, so you deal with one every lap.

Just "hold your line". Nothing about taking the fastest line, the racing line. Just to hold. The other bits are fun, too. Reality is what matters. Not what the stewards say (unless they're disqualifying your car, then they're god).

At this point I'm just assuming Kaufman didn't see the Audi. If a NASCAR driver says a car's hard to see out of, you listen.
 
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To change the subject slightly... we all know that the 787B ran some demo laps at Le Mans this year. Well... Mazda were gracious enough to fit onboard cameras. :D


And a nice touch at the end to have Johnny up on the podium, after his win at Le Mans in '91 he couldn't stand on the podium due to dehydration and food poisoning.
 
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If Mazda is really allowed next year, will they do it in the Furai? :eek:
 
Jesus that sounds wonderful! Very similar to a F1 car. And Johnny got really really fat!
 
Just to nudge at the Kaufman incident, during Midweek Motorsport it was pointed out the gap between the track surface and the grass is very large and can easily throw a car off.

The problem is, we're commenting on it from the outside; we don't know what was going through Rocky's head or through Rob's head. For all we know, Rocky could have thought Rob was going wide and thought the space he went into was the track.
 
On another note, is there anyone who thinks the effort of the works Aston Martins at this year's race has not been disgraceful by any stretch of the imagination?

Slower than a Norma, lasting a total of 6 laps between the two of them, beaten in completed distance by a barely-tested Oreca with a hybrid powerplant that nearly made it to Sunday morning... I need a new sig that doesn't feature the shambolic AMR-One.
 
On another note, is there anyone who thinks the effort of the works Aston Martins at this year's race has not been disgraceful by any stretch of the imagination?

Slower than a Norma, lasting a total of 6 laps between the two of them, beaten in completed distance by a barely-tested Oreca with a hybrid powerplant that nearly made it to Sunday morning... I need a new sig that doesn't feature the shambolic AMR-One.

I thought their performance was pretty horrible as well. Their car was significantly slower than the old Lola-Aston this year (Which managed to finish the race, unlike the AMR-Ones), and it's shocking how a manufacturer-backed car was out of it so quickly.
 
Yeah, Kronos/Marc VDS had pretty much zero experience with the old Lola-Aston and yet managed to heap a few tons of embarassment on the factory team by bringing the car home in 7th overall.
 
A Fezza's nearly went into orbit in one of the support races:

 
Nasty crash with Jan Magnussen and Horst Felbermayr, who had punctured lung and a few broken bones after this :


 
Nasty crash with Jan Magnussen and Horst Felbermayr, who had punctured lung and a few broken bones after this :

Wrong, Felbermayr snr. suffered bruised legs and a concussion after this. There's a bit of confusion between injuries in this incident and Michael Wainwright's accident in the Karting Esses at 4 AM in the #60 Aston, he was the one that suffered cracked ribs+pelvis and a punctured lung after that crash.
 
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