Report: Race 2 Quotes, Nogaro 2008

Quotes

James Ruffier – No.1 Martini Callaway Racing Corvette Z.06R GT3, 1st: “I am much happier now than I was yesterday! Yesterday was a really bad day for us, because we were pretty fast at the end of the race before we had the problem with the differential. Today we started from the pole position but I got a poor start because I had no grip at the rear – when I used full throttle I got a lot of wheelspin. So I tried to keep in contact with the two cars ahead of me, and concentrated on looking after the car. It wasn’t easy, because you always want to overtake, but today the points were important. This is really good for the team – they worked until 6am this morning repairing the car. During my stint I had some braking problems, it was really inconsistent, which meant I had to be really careful when I was trying to overtaking Thomas Mutsch in the Ford GT.”

 

Arnaud Peyroles – No.1 Martini Callaway Racing Corvette Z.06R GT3, 1st: “It might have looked easy, but it wasn’t. Now we will go to Dubai, where I think we can forget everything that’s gone before – results, statistics, lap times. Anything could happen – we might even be champions! It’s better to go there with an eight-point lead than eight points behind.”

 

Johan-Boris Scheier – No.29 AutoGT Racing Morgan Aero 8 GT3, 2nd: “Over the last two years, since the beginning of the project, we’ve made a lot of progress. We’ve had a few technical problems this year, which have prevented us from getting good results. The car is now reliable, it is running well, and this is an excellent result for us.”

 

Gaël Lesoudier – No.29 AutoGT Racing Morgan Aero 8 GT3, 2nd: “This is an amazing result for AutoGT and for Morgan. Johan-Boris did a great job, and handed the car over to me in seventh place. When I started I had a bit of oversteer but the car got better after a few minutes. I could be confident under braking and overtook several cars at the end of the back straight. In the closing laps I had a big gap, so I could ease off and make sure I got to the chequered flag. We don’t know the circuit in Dubai, but I’ve heard that it’s a fantastic track. The Morgan is good on fast circuits, so we will be looking for another podium finish.”

 

Alex Mortimer – No.21 Matech GT Racing Ford GT, 3rd: “Neither of us have been here before, so we knew we would have an uphill struggle – and then the qualifying session wasn’t ideal. I lost a few places when I was avoiding a first-lap incident, so then I had to overtake a few cars. We always knew that Bradley would be one of the faster drivers in the second half, and he did a great job.”

 

Bradley Ellis – No.21 Matech GT Racing Ford GT, 3rd: “My stint was very busy – I had a new car to tackle every la. We had a slight gearbox problem that developed in Alex’s stint, which prevented us staying hard on the throttle when changing up. That cost us a bit of speed down the straights, which then made it difficult to outbrake people. Apart from that the car was great – Matech did a great job.”

 

Vincent Vosse – No.40 Mühlner Motorsport Porsche 997 GT3 Cup S, 5th: “I managed to hold position during my spell in the car – the Porsche was perfect, no problems with the tyres. The team worked well overnight, because it felt much better than it did yesterday.”

 

Jaromir Jirik - No.40 Mühlner Motorsport Porsche 997 GT3 Cup S, 5th: “I couldn’t have achieved this result without Vincent – because he was the best! Unfortunately I lost a podium place in the last-lap incident – Pirri just pushed me off the track. He had no room, there was no space there. So I’m pretty unhappy with that, although at the time I didn’t even know I was third!”

 

Jose Manuel Balbiani – No.5 Kessel Racing Ferrari F430 GT3, 6th: “So I’m Ferrari Cup Champion? That sounds great! Honestly, I didn’t even know. With this car, fighting against cars like the Corvette and Ford GT is quite hard. Yesterday we had a spin and were third of the Ferraris, and then the first-lap chaos dropped us back. But the early safety car helped us a lot, and I had a good stint. And then Claudio drove a great race to keep us in the points – it’s a good day for us!”

 

Robert Hissom – No.32 APEX Motorsport Jaguar XKR, 19th: “Ben did a fantastic job from starting 32nd, and handed it over to me in about fifteenth. Unfortunately I let one or two guys past me, but I had a great race; the car handled well and the team did a great job.”

 

Ben Clucas – No.32 APEX Motorsport Jaguar XKR, 19th: “That was a really good race – there were some good dices and some overtaking. There weren’t many crashes, so the places we made up were actually on the track. We were battling in the pack, which was great fun; and importantly, we ended with the car in one piece.”

2008-10-05
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