Datum: 12.03.2011 · Sonstige

Successful winterseries guest appearance


The ILMC-Saison is yet about to start, but german sportscarpilot Pierre Ehret was just too motivated to limit himself to workout exercises. So he decided to take a warm-up on the track during the last round of Orecas winterseries on the HTTT-track at Le Castellet, France. Last weekend the 53 year old sportscar-privateer shared a Formula Le Mans-car with italian teammate Roberto Plati. The 2011-season will see Ehret at the wheel of a CRS-Ferrari in the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup. But on the weekend he traded his GTE-Am-car with a JMB-Prototype he tested some months earlier and archieved 1 win, including the teams overall-classification of the weekend.
 
„It was a successful weekend. The winterseries consists of 2 sprintraces for each pilot of a team and a kind of endurance-race of 1h duration with driver-change. My sprint began promising with a start from pole-position. Over the whole race I was batteling myself with Karim Ojjeh, another competitor I know well from the Le Mans Series.  I was long time in front until I spun the car, which allowed Karim to pass in his agile but strong Radical SR8. I rejoined in 4th but was able to improve on 2nd position till the flag. The Formula Le Mans is really another level in terms of downforce, acceleration and its crude breaking forces, compared to the Ferraris I normally drive. But it was a good exercise“
 
Pierres Teammate Plati, an italian driver with experiences in various GT2-Ferraris, won his leg, so in the endurance-race on sunday – in front of officially 1500 spectators - it was Pierres Turn to start the race and put his prototype in front of the 30car-field. „It was yet another battle between me and Ojjeh in his Radical. I was able to hold him for the majority of my turn but let him go short before the driver change as I knew that Roberto has had the better hand over Karims Teammate Gary Chalandon. It turned out perfect for us as Roberto was not only getting th chequered flag first but also the second JMB-Formula Le Mans of Peter Kuteman came home on 2nd place.  It was a successful guest appeareance in this series indeed.“
 
Pierre Ehret is now further preparing himself for the 58.th 12h of Sebring, which he will start on the weekend of the 19th March.