Race: Biela, Pirro back to winning ways

Emanuele Pirro danced a victory jig on the podium to celebrate the first ALMS win of the year for himself and Frank Biela in the Audi R8 – but for the first two hours it looked as if David Brabham and Jan Magnussen were going to pull off a second consecutive win for the revitalised Panoz team.

It was the wettest start to an ALMS race so far. Polesitter Rinaldo Capello fell out of contention on the first lap, losing the number 1 R8 on the run up the hill to the Turn 5 hairpin. Andy Wallace and Franck Lagorce spun in sympathy, though Wallace emerged unscathed, pitted for intermediate tyres and charged back through the field to third within a handful of laps.

Magnussen took a firm grip on the lead but the Panoz dropped to third when the team opted to change all four tyres at the penultimate pit stop. Johnny Herbert then looked odds on to win in the Champion Audi until the team changed just one tyre at the last round of stops. Pirro didn't and emerged 12s ahead of Herbert who crashed out heavily as he pushed to make up the deficit.

The Cadillacs had arguably their best ALMS race ever in terms of both pace and the result to finish third and fourth ahead of Dyson's Riley & Scott Mk III C. Dyson's car could have managed third but for a late-race off.

Claudia Huertgen made the early LMP675 running in the KnightHawk Lola-Nissan but it was Didier de Radigues and Bruno Lambert, in Dick Barbour's Reynard-Judd, who stamped their authority on the class. De Radigues started from the rear of the grid after his qualifying time was disallowed and made it as high as second overall when conditions were at their worst. Lambert, already a multiple class winner in GT and GTS, also impressed in his first race outing in the car.

Another class winner starting from the rear of the grid was Ron Fellows, who jumped 10 positions on the first lap alone in the Chevrolet Corvette C5-R. He had a brief off which deranged the rear bodywork but handed over to Johnny O'Connell in the GTS class lead. In contrast the Saleen S7-R went backwards at the beginning of the race but Terry Borcheller brought it within striking distance of the lead during the final stint. Happily for the lead Corvette pairing, the pace came out between the two during the final full-course yellow, extending O'Connell's advantage to almost a whole lap.

GT was all about the BMW M3 GTRs. JJ Lehto and Jorg Muller won – again from the tail of the grid - from team mates Fredrik Ekblom and Dirk Muller. PTG's Hans Stuck and Boris Said were third. Alex Job Racing's pair of McKenna Porsche 911 GT3-RSs both had a spirited stab at breaking BMW's stranglehold, with Lucas Luhr and Sascha Maassen fourth.

Britain's Johnny Mowlem didn't get an opportunity to take the wheel of the Petersen/White Lightning 911 – team mate Timo Bernhard crashed out before he got in the car.



Biela/Pirro (Audi) 115 laps
Magnussen/Brabham (Panoz) - 2 laps
Tinseau/Collard (Cadillac) - 3 laps
Taylor/Angelelli (Cadillac) - 3 laps
Weaver/Leitzinger (Riley&Scott-Lincoln) - 3 laps
de Radigues/Lambert (Reynard-Judd) - 4 laps
Fellows/O`Connell (Chevrolet) - 6 laps
Konrad/Borcheller (Saleen) - 7 laps
Pilgrim/Collins (Chevrolet) - 8 laps
Lehto/Muller (BMW) - 8 laps