The most moving sight for team drivers Nick Leventis, Danny Watts and Jonny Kane last year was standing on the top step of the Le Mans podium, listening to the British National Anthem and watching a sea of Union Jacks being waved amongst the 250,000 strong crowd.
Last year, the team set a new LMP2 lap record (3:33.079), finished 5th overall (the highest position ever achieved by LMP2 car), finished 1st in the Michelin Green X Challenge, covered the greatest race distance ever achieved by a LMP2 car and spend the shortest ever amount of time in the pits.
However, new technical regulations for 2011 from the organizing Automobile Club de l’Ouest (ACO) mean that this year’s HPD ARX-01d race car is 95kgs heavier and 75bhp less powerful than the ARX-01c it replaces. An air restrictor will also reduce the straight line speed of the car, ensuring lap times will be slower than in 2010.
“We’re going to Le Mans this year to try and win it again. It would be great to score a back-to-back victory, although we think we’ll be slightly down on performance because of our engine’s air restrictor, but we’ll go there and try to do what we do at every race – and that’s to race hard, try to stay out of trouble and make sure we’re there at the end. We know that Le Mans will be a lot more difficult to win this year,” said driver Nick Leventis.
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