It's LeMans week - The Race Is On!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Tim@Fourtitude]

Hey everybody!

As we all know, it's LeMans week, and the attention of the motorsports world is turning to a country town in the west of France.

Fourtitude's Editor in Chief, George Achorn is in LeMans this week, embedded with the Audi Sport team. George will be providing updates each day, and live coverage during the race. In depth articles will be posted to http://fourtitude.com/ - there is already coverage there of scrutineering, the autograph sessions, and a Q&A with driver Marc Gene, who was brought onboard to replace Timo Bernhard, who is still recovering from a crash at Sebring during Audi's test sessions there after the 12 hour race in March.

We will be posting live updates during the race to our Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/FourtitudeAudiSite as well as to twitter.

For some lead up to the race, we have some videos that are worth the time to watch:

First up is our interview with "Mr. LeMans" himself, Tom Kristensen. Tom has won LeMans (and Sebring) more times than any other person, and we sat down with him in the Audi Sport team bus on Monday morning after the Sebring race to catch his thoughts on the new R18 e-tron quattro race car, preparing for LeMans, and a funny story about a run-in with local law enforcement:



After we got finished talking with Tom, we thought we'd sit down with his boss, Dr. Wolfgang Ullrich, the head of Audi Sport. We discussed the development of the R18 Ultra and the R18 e-tron quattro, as well as the drama of last year's LeMans, and preparation for this year's race.



As I said, George is in LeMans with the team all week, and on Monday he had the chance to sit down with driver Dindo Capello and discuss this year's race as well as the particulars of driving and getting used to the new hybrid R18 e-tron quattro.



On Tuesday, George grabbed some time with 2011 winning driver Andre Lotterer, who spent some time giving insights on what went in to winning last year's race from the perspective of the drivers.



We will keep posting more updates as we get them, but I figured that some of you guys in here would enjoy seeing this stuff.

Addition for Friday....

We've added some new videos to our Youtube channel, Fourtitube.


First up is George's interview of Marco Bonanomi on Tuesday. Although this is Marco's first LeMans, he was one of the development drivers for the R18, and so he has logged a LOT of miles in them and has some good insights into the cars. Marco will be sharing R18 Ultra #4 with Oliver Jarvis and Mike Rockenfeller.


Second up is friend of Fourtitude Allan McNish. Allan is a double LeMans winner, and of course will be sharing his car with Dindo Capello and Mr. LeMans, Tom Kristensen. Dindo makes a "guest appearance" early in the interview, and it's a good insight into their camaraderie. Known as the "Scottish Terrier" for his aggressive attacking of traffic, Allan has some good insights into how the R18 e-tron quattro will combine with a newly repaved track to change passing strategy, as well as how the famous LeMans rainy weather may come in to play.



-Tim

[compy222]

Ullrich is just so entertaining...

great set of links/vids. best of luck to all the drivers!

[Double-V]

I'm most curious to see how the deltawing performs.

[David@vwvortex]

Sounds like the Deltawing had some issues yesterday. They are STILL running on the tires that they had run at the LM tests. From what I've read they want to be able to go 10 stints or so on the tires. Also I guess they have given up on the torque vectoring diff b/c of problems w/the gearbox that they have been having.

Timing wise they are smack in the middle of LMP2 times, but there is clearly more potential in the car.

BTW.. some helpful links.

www.radiolemans.com
www.dailysportscar.com
10/10ths forums
http://www.ten-tenths.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=7

and of course more importantly www.fourtitude.com

[Cort]

Insanely jealous.

[karl_1052]

How about a 24 hour movie following the Audi team, real time.

http://truthin24.com/country-selector

And they are making a sequel.

[Tim@Fourtitude]

Ullrich is just so entertaining...

Agreed. I could have sit there in that bus and listened to him talk all day, literally. He's also an incredibly nice, humble person, especially considering his position and accomplishments.

As a "racing dork" moment, while we were shooting that video (and I was taking stills as well) my knee was bumping against the trophy from the 12 Hours of Sebring that they had won two days before. The bus was packed with all of the drivers' and manufacturers' trophies from the race.

great set of links/vids. best of luck to all the drivers!

Thank you.

I'm most curious to see how the deltawing performs.

Me too. It's an oddball car for sure, but goes with the tradition of innovation that LeMans endurance racing has always fostered, and that's cool by me.

How about a 24 hour movie following the Audi team, real time.

http://truthin24.com/country-selector

And they are making a sequel.

If you're referring to Truth in 24, it's not a 24 hour movie, and it's not real time. It is a great documentary, though, and you're correct, they did make a sequel. We hosted a premiere of it a few weeks back and it's also very, very good. It covers last year's race, which Audi won by 13 seconds.

I am super excited about this weekend.

-Tim

[Cousin Eddie]

Time for me to start hunting down my online Eurosport feed....

[karl_1052]

If you're referring to Truth in 24, it's not a 24 hour movie, and it's not real time. It is a great documentary, though, and you're correct, they did make a sequel. We hosted a premiere of it a few weeks back and it's also very, very good. It covers last year's race, which Audi won by 13 seconds.

I am super excited about this weekend.

-Tim

Good to know. Now I won't need to buy depends.

[David@vwvortex]

Oh.. one more helpful link to follow qually/race, etc.

http://thomasbaekdal.com/mini-sites/lemans2012/

Great feed with times and tweets, pics etc. HIGHLY recommend anyone following the race this year to use that as it's way more reliable that even the T&S from lemans.org.

[RogueTDI]

Thanks for heads up!

Life gets so busy... Cant believe its already another year, another June!

[dubjager]

Really looking forward to seeing the hybrids duke it out. Can't imagine it will be without problems, but that is what GT is for... I kid!

[Air and water do mix]

I get to have some time to myself this weekend since it's Father's Day. Gotta invite a couple of friends over and watch some good ol' all-American racin'. Errrrr, I mean good ol' all-French racin'.

[GPHawaii808]

Listening to the live coverage of qualifying on Radio Le Mans: http://radiolemans.0157.org/node

Other information can be found here: http://www.lemanslive.com/

Between Speed & Speed.com, the entire race will be shown or streamed live.

[n0rdicalex.]

if only there was a way to mute Scott Pruett on Speed.

[redwe-in-wi]

if only there was a way to mute Scott Pruett on Speed.

I can't stand that db. He never shuts up about Grand Am and the Rolex 24. He is just an arrogant prick.

[J-Tim]

if only there was a way to mute Scott Pruett on Speed.

You can.

Go to www.radiolemans.com, register and press "Listen Live" button on the left to listen for the live feed.

[n0rdicalex.]

i definitely do that, but the Speed feed seems to be off from their radio feed, and that bothers me for some reason.

either way, i typically have a laptop running, my desktop running, and tv running during the race. each one has different live timing, in-car streams, team radio streams, or whatever else i can find to make the experience that much more nerdy.

[BeBop!]

Drive channel on youtube is having live coverage. Can't wait for that.

[Tim@Fourtitude]

We've added some new videos to our Youtube channel, Fourtitube.


First up is George's interview of Marco Bonanomi on Tuesday. Although this is Marco's first LeMans, he was one of the development drivers for the R18, and so he has logged a LOT of miles in them and has some good insights into the cars. Marco will be sharing R18 Ultra #4 with Oliver Jarvis and Mike Rockenfeller.


Second up is friend of Fourtitude Allan McNish. Allan is a double LeMans winner, and of course will be sharing his car with Dindo Capello and Mr. LeMans, Tom Kristensen. Dindo makes a "guest appearance" early in the interview, and it's a good insight into their camaraderie. Known as the "Scottish Terrier" for his aggressive attacking of traffic, Allan has some good insights into how the R18 e-tron quattro will combine with a newly repaved track to change passing strategy, as well as how the famous LeMans rainy weather may come in to play.


I am also adding these to the first post.

-Tim

[Tim@Fourtitude]

Afternoon bump.



-Tim

[woodrowstar]

Thank you for the heads up. It has been difficult for me to follow most racing this year, due to my current adventure.

[RogueTDI]

Is there a diesel face-off this year? Doesnt look like it...

[jimbogxp]

Hey everybody!

As we all know, it's LeMans week, and the attention of the motorsports world is turning to a country town in the west of France.

-Tim

I am eternally GRATEFUL to you for posting this thread. I had no clue LeMans was this weekend. If not for your thread I would have missed it and been royally upset on Monday.

THANK YOU SO MUCH.

Reps to the moon.

[euromaxituning]

Looking forward to what the Spaniard will bring to the table. He's got Peugeot blood in his veins.

[DannyLo]

I love this time of year.

I love how this race is the hub for automotive innovation, and it's real where politics don't ruin it unlike other un-named forms of auto racing

I was awake an unhealthy amount of last year watching more of the race than I should've, and I will probably do the same this year

[Silly_me]

Is there a diesel face-off this year? Doesnt look like it...

Hybrid face-off. Less than an hour to go.......

[ATL_Av8r]

Go everyone but Audi

[Silly_me]

Go everyone but Audi

You rooted against Porsche in the 80s too I bet

[Air and water do mix]

I love this time of year.

I love how this race is the hub for automotive innovation, and it's real where politics don't ruin it unlike other un-named forms of auto racing

Yessir. This is far and away my favorite race of any type. The innovation is unparalleled and there's so much less in the way of politics involved. This isn't to say there are no politics, but compared to NASCAR and F1? Almost none!

[canadacraig]

just cracked my first beer, almost race start here on the west coast.


GO AUDI!

[Tim@Fourtitude]

Well, the race is on, and true to form, Allan McNish has made a pass on the very first couple of corners to move up to position 3.

I'll periodically update this thread, but most of our "live" coverage will be via Facebook and Twitter:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FourtitudeAudiSite - main updates will be here
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/#!/fourtitude - the main Fourtitude account
https://twitter.com/#!/r18 - R18 #1 - Fassler, Lotterer, Treluyer
https://twitter.com/#!/AudiR18_2 - R18 e-tron quattro #2 - McNish, Capello, Kristensen
https://twitter.com/#!/AudiR18_3 - R18 Ultra #3 - Dumas, Duval, Gene
https://twitter.com/#!/AudiR18_4 - R18 Ultra #4 - Bonanomi, Jarvis, Rockenfeller

Updates specific to each car or driver will be on the twitter accounts.

-Tim

[ATL_Av8r]

You rooted against Porsche in the 80s too I bet

Who?

[Ubel GLI]

Best race of the year. So excited. Just gonna lay on the couch for hours

[ATL_Av8r]

Currently cable-less. Is this streamed anywhere? Doesn't need to have sound either. Can't stand listening to them try to crap out 24 hours worth of small talk anyway.