The Parts Alliance’s ongoing ‘Original Experience’ promotion has a top prize-winner. Omer Hassan, director of Queensway Auto Repairs found the winning scratch card on Monday 16 March. The Enfield independent garage, established 15 years, undertakes MOTs, service and repairs, on mainly German cars.
Goodyear is to serve as official tyre supplier to the LMP2 category of the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) and European Le Mans Series (ELMS). This arrangement follows the decision made by the Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) to appoint a single tyre supplier for the Le Mans Prototype class.
Avon Tyres will celebrate its famous victory at the 1959 24 Hours of Le Mans with Aston Martin during this year’s Autumn Classic at Castle Combe on 5 October. Established in 2012, the Autumn Classic has developed into a popular event on the classic racing calendar, providing grids full of spectacular cars from the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s.
The Apollo Tyres TOR Truck Racing team will bring its racing truck ‘Thelma’ to Le Mans on 28-29 September for its final 2019 appearance on track. The team has been making a few alterations to the racing truck following a successful weekend at the ‘Convoy in the Park’ event at Donington in August, in preparation for the penultimate rounds of the European Truck Racing Championship.
Goodyear and Brabham Automotive have announced a new partnership to collaborate across racing and road car developments. The new partnership both coincides with the return to racing of the Brabham marque and reignites a winning partnership that began in 1965.
When Goodyear launched its Eagle F1 series and Supersport tyres back in April, the company said this branding decision meant Goodyear was coming “back to the track”. Now we know precisely what this means as Goodyear has announced that it will re-enter European and International sportscar racing by developing a new range of tyres for the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), including the Le Mans 24-hour race.
After four years of partnership with Bridgestone, Belgian motorcycle brand Saroléa has now selected Dunlop as a technical partner for its Saroléa SP7 electric racing motorcycle. Dunlop comments that the change of technical partner accompanies yesterday’s announcement of the next goal for Saroléa, which is to be recognised as a candidate for future Le Mans 24h and FIM Endurance World Championship (EWC) competition and thus directly compete with the most powerful petrol-powered EWC machines. The switch, adds Dunlop, was a move Saroléa made “to help achieve this goal.”
The new Dunlop Sport Maxx Race 2 has been approved by Porsche as original equipment for the new 911 GT3 RS. The tyre brand will supply sizes 265/35ZR20 (99Y) XL and 325/30ZR21 (108Y) XL to Porsche, both tyres carrying the N1 marking to indicate Porsche homologation.
Dunlop’s Le Mans 24 Hours 2017 is one to remember with records broken, overall race laps led, and overall podiums in addition to the more typical class wins and podiums, in a race with high temperatures testing cars and drivers. Track temperatures exceeded 50 degrees towards the end of Sunday’s race in France’s Sarthe region.
Last year, Dunlop returned to GT racing in the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC), taking the Teams’ and Drivers’ titles, five wins and nine podium finishes with Aston Martin Racing. The experience the tyre maker gained, however, is of limited help, as a complete change in tyre regulations was introduced for the 2017 season. These changes place fresh demands upon the tyres used and bring different criteria for Dunlop’s tyre designers and engineers to focus on.
Dunlop has released a new video with senior engineer, racing car tyre development, Vincent van Goor explaining its tyre development ahead of this year’s Le Mans 24 Hours. A record number of LMP2 cars will compete on the manufacturer’s rubber – 22 of the 25 entrants. All of the cars are racing on the La Sarthe track for the first time courtesy of new regulations for 2017. The race starts at 15:00 CEST on Saturday 17 June.
Pirelli has renewed its sponsorship of the Village on the Curves at Le Mans for 2017, as part of the Italian tyre company’s relationship with Porsche Club GB. The Village on the Curve is a camping village located on the Porsche Curves at the French circuit. Porsche owners flock to the village to enjoy the views of the track and community atmosphere.
Earlier this month, Bridgestone’s Nico Thuy commented that the tyre maker was “aiming for great results with our new team partners” during the year’s FIM Endurance World Championship (EWC) series, and during the second round event this goal was realised with a second-place finish. On 16 April, some 75,000 spectators watched the YART Yamaha Official EWC Team finish the 24 Heures Motos Le Mans less than 20 seconds behind fellow Yamaha-backed team GMT 94. The two teams finished 12 laps ahead of the rest of the field.
