Saturday, 9 June - The
Champion
Racing Audi R8 team is on site at Le Mans for the 2001 running of the historic
24 Hours. Although the Build Team had been in Germany preparing our car for
more than a week, the Support Team arrived in France on Thursday the 7th. After
arriving at Paris' Charles de Gaule airport, the team traveled to Le Mans via
TGV train. With the car and Build Team due to arrive late Friday, we set to
work preparing our garage space; laying the floor, building the walls and work
areas and setting up work lighting.
The garages at Le Mans are long and narrow - the front opens on pit lane, and
the car transporters back up to the rear opening. Between each of the garages
is a metal screen removable wall, and multi-car teams take down these walls
to give more continuous workspace. Our single garage unit (fourth from Pit Out)
is sufficient for our needs, and we've transformed it into a reasonably comfortable
place to work for the next week. Right now we can work on parts of the car out
in Pit Lane, but once the track action starts all of that must be moved inside.
There is a white line just outside the front garage door, and this is considered
the "pit wall". Only designated over-the-wall pit crew can cross the
line and actually be in the pit lane. Because only four people are allowed to
work on the car during pit stops, the car has been made very easy to maneuver
into the garage, so that the whole crew can work on it when needed.
As of Saturday morning the entire R8 crew is on hand, and serious preparations
have begun on the car. We need several sets of spare bodywork for this event,
so our paint and body crew, along with graphics man Dave Schnorr have been hard
at work preparing all the identical sets of bodywork in the trademark Champion
livery. We want to look our best, because Champion is first-up for official
Scrutineering on Monday, beginning at 2:30pm in downtown Le Mans. Scrutineering
will continue on Tuesday till all of the teams have been passed, and the first
track sessions begin late next Wednesday evening, running till midnight both
Wednesday and Thursday.
Friday is a non-track day, and the annual "Pit Walk" is held, where
the pit lane is opened, free to the general public, and masses of people turn
out to meet the teams and get a close look at all the perfectly-prepared racing
machines. On Friday evening there is a parade in downtown Le Mans, where the
drivers for the 24 Hours are driven through the city center with much fanfare.
We'll share it all with you right here. Meanwhile, enjoy the photos below, showing
some of our early preparations for Le Mans 2001...
Racing Audi R8 team is on site at Le Mans for the 2001 running of the historic
24 Hours. Although the Build Team had been in Germany preparing our car for
more than a week, the Support Team arrived in France on Thursday the 7th. After
arriving at Paris' Charles de Gaule airport, the team traveled to Le Mans via
TGV train. With the car and Build Team due to arrive late Friday, we set to
work preparing our garage space; laying the floor, building the walls and work
areas and setting up work lighting.
The garages at Le Mans are long and narrow - the front opens on pit lane, and
the car transporters back up to the rear opening. Between each of the garages
is a metal screen removable wall, and multi-car teams take down these walls
to give more continuous workspace. Our single garage unit (fourth from Pit Out)
is sufficient for our needs, and we've transformed it into a reasonably comfortable
place to work for the next week. Right now we can work on parts of the car out
in Pit Lane, but once the track action starts all of that must be moved inside.
There is a white line just outside the front garage door, and this is considered
the "pit wall". Only designated over-the-wall pit crew can cross the
line and actually be in the pit lane. Because only four people are allowed to
work on the car during pit stops, the car has been made very easy to maneuver
into the garage, so that the whole crew can work on it when needed.
As of Saturday morning the entire R8 crew is on hand, and serious preparations
have begun on the car. We need several sets of spare bodywork for this event,
so our paint and body crew, along with graphics man Dave Schnorr have been hard
at work preparing all the identical sets of bodywork in the trademark Champion
livery. We want to look our best, because Champion is first-up for official
Scrutineering on Monday, beginning at 2:30pm in downtown Le Mans. Scrutineering
will continue on Tuesday till all of the teams have been passed, and the first
track sessions begin late next Wednesday evening, running till midnight both
Wednesday and Thursday.
Friday is a non-track day, and the annual "Pit Walk" is held, where
the pit lane is opened, free to the general public, and masses of people turn
out to meet the teams and get a close look at all the perfectly-prepared racing
machines. On Friday evening there is a parade in downtown Le Mans, where the
drivers for the 24 Hours are driven through the city center with much fanfare.
We'll share it all with you right here. Meanwhile, enjoy the photos below, showing
some of our early preparations for Le Mans 2001...
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Siggi, Brad and Mike brainstorm...