By Tarek Ramchani
A new era has started in North American sportscar racing, as Sebring is hosting the first ever TUDOR United SportsCar Championship official test days this weekend. Four Audi R8 LMS cars are taking part in the test, entered by three different teams, two of them are new Audi customer racing teams.
The teams are Flying Lizard Motorsports, Fall-Line Motorsports and Paul Miller Racing. Their cars performed very well within the GT Daytona class (GTD) in the two sessions held yesterday. Interesting to note that some Audi factory drivers are also on site to support the American teams. Benoit Treluyer is with Paul Miller Racing, both Marco Bonanomi and Oliver Jarvis are with Flying Lizard Motorsports and Audi GT driver Christopher Mies is with Fall-Line Motorsports.
The driver line-up at Flying Lizard Motorsports for the test included Seth Neiman, Spencer Pumpelly, Dion von Moltke, Nelson Canache, Oliver Jarvis and Marco Bonanomi. The Fall-Line Motorsports #46 Audi R8 LMS was driven by Christopher Mies, Charles Putman, Charles Espenlaub, Bryan Sellers and Al Carter. The Paul Miller Racing #48 R8 LMS had Bryce Miller and Benoît Treluyer behind the wheel.
In the first session the #46 Audi R8 LMS from Fall-Line Motorsports was the best ranked Audi car and placed second within the GTD class, with a fastest time of 2:05.323, right behind a Ferrari 458. The two R8 LMS cars from Flying Lizard Motorsports were respectively third (#45 Audi) and fourth (#35 Audi) in class. The #48 Audi R8 LMS from Paul Miller Racing was seventh in class.
Later only two Audi R8 LMS cars took part in the second session. The #46 Audi R8 LMS from Fall-Line Motorsports was again the best Audi car in fourth place in the GTD class. The #45 Audi R8 LMS from Flying Lizard Motorsports was right behind in fifth place. The Porsche 911 GT America dominated the second session by locking out the top three positions.
The first session results can be seen here.
The second session results can be seen here.
Track action will resume today at Sebring for another day of testing. We wish the best of luck to all three Audi teams and their new Audi R8 LMS cars.
Photo credit: TUDOR United SportsCar Championship
