Racing History
Two B09/60s competed in the full Le Mans Series season, while a third car entered under the AMR Eastern Europe banner for Charouz Racing Systems also competed at the 2009 24 Hours of Le Mans and in the last three races of the LMS. The number 007 car won the Le Mans Series overall, and the number 009 finished fourth.
At Le Mans the B09/60 of Jan Charouz, Tomáš Enge and Stefan Mücke finished fourth behind the factory entries of Peugeot and Audi, as well as being the highest finishing petrol-fuelled car. The 008 car was running as high as 3rd overall in the morning until Anthony Davidson had a collision with a GT1 Aston. Subsequent repairs and a 5-minute stop and go penalty—for causing the collision—dropped the car out of contention.
A Lola Aston Martin competed at the 2010 12 Hours of Sebring, which marked the first time the Lola - Aston Martin entered a race in the United States. The Lowe's-sponsored car finishing the race in 3rd position, three laps behind the two winning Peugeots. No factory cars were entered into the 2010 1000 km of Spa. Three cars have also been entered in the 2010 24 Hours of Le Mans, although only the 007 and 009 cars will be run by Aston Martin Racing; the 008 car is scheduled to be run by the French team Signature-Plus. Both the 008 and 009 cars suffered from problems and had to be retired, leaving only the 007 to finish 6th overall and completing 365 laps, less than it did in 2009. It was the third highest petrol finisher behind Oreca and the LMP2 winner Strakka HPD.
At the 1000 km of Silverstone, the Lola-Aston Martin finished 4th and the highest petrol finisher.
In 2011, the car was raced by Team Cytosport in the American Le Mans Series with regular drivers Klaus Graf and Lucas Luhr. The team failed to finish the first round at the 12 Hours of Sebring, but rebounded by overtaking the polesitting Dyson Racing car at Long Beach to take the win. The team went on to win again at Mosport, Mid-Ohio and Road America and finished the season in second place in the LMP1 category behind Dyson Racing.
With Aston Martin Racing switching to their new car, the AMR-One for the 2011 24 Hours of Le Mans, a B09/60 was entered by Kronos Racing in cooperation with fellow Belgian outfit Marc VDS Racing Team. The car was driven by Vanina Ickx, Bas Leinders and Maxime Martin and finished the race seventh overall, twenty-seven laps behind the race winning Audi R18 TDI.
After suffering reliability problems and a lack of speed with its new AMR-One prototype, Aston Martin Racing will revert to using a B09/60 for the final three rounds of the 2011 Intercontinental Le Mans Cup as well as round eight of the 2011 American Le Mans Series season, the American Le Mans Monterey at Laguna Seca.. The lone factory Aston started third behind the two Dyson Lola machines, but the race would end with the Aston winning by three laps, notching up another victory for the car. The grandfathered car also got a surprise podium finish at Petit Le Mans after 3 of the 4 factory cars (Audi and Peugeot) crashed.
Read more about this topic: Lola-Aston Martin B09/60
Famous quotes containing the words racing and/or history:
“Upscale people are fixated with food simply because they are now able to eat so much of it without getting fat, and the reason they don’t get fat is that they maintain a profligate level of calorie expenditure. The very same people whose evenings begin with melted goat’s cheese ... get up at dawn to run, break for a mid-morning aerobics class, and watch the evening news while racing on a stationary bicycle.”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
“All history is a record of the power of minorities, and of minorities of one.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)