Champion Audi fastest in Trois-Rivieres testing

1 Aug - The ADT Champion Racing Audi R8, by the slimmest of margins, set the fast time of the day Friday as American Le Mans Series race teams had two hours of testing for Sunday's Le Grand Prix de Trois-Rivieres.

Johnny Herbert and JJ Lehto will share the Champion Audi R8, which led Friday's unofficial test session with a lap of 59.741 seconds on the 1.521-mile, 11-turn temporary street circuit. But close behind them was the Dyson Racing Lola EX257-MG of James Weaver and Butch Leitzinger, winner of last week's ALMS event at Sonoma, Calif., at 59.895 seconds.

Lehto was in the Champion Audi R8 when it set the fast time late in the session. The Finn is making his first appearance in the historic Trois-Rivieres event, which is being run for the 35th time.

"I was quite happy with the circuit," said Lehto, who formerly raced in both Formula One and CART. "The surface is the same everywhere, which is not like a lot of other street circuits. The corners are nice and well-made, and the circuit is not too bumpy.

"We did our normal Friday setup work and didn't try to do anything special," he said.