July 17-19, 2008
Mid-Ohio Sports Car Course – Lexington, OH
NBC SPORTS: Noon-2:30 p.m. ET – Sunday, July 20 

1. At Le Mans, the top six prototype finishers including all three Audi R10 entries were diesel-powered race cars, a precedent setting achievement for the new racing technology that first came to the Series grid in 2006 at Sebring.

The Audi R10s at Le Mans competed for the first time with second-generation bio fuel and logged 381 laps in its victory (5,192.649 kilometers), a new record in the current circuit configuration.

2. Risi Competizione won its first class title at Le Mans as 2007 Series GT2 champions Jaime Melo and Mika Salo teamed with Gianmaria Bruni for a breakthrough class victory.

After winning nine times in 2007, the Salo/Melo pairing recorded its first Series podium finish of the season last week at Lime Rock.

3. Michelin won for the 17th time at Le Mans, 11th in a row.

• In Series competition, Audi has streaked to victory in 27 straight LMP1 victories, including 23 in a row by the innovative R10 TDI, an all-time Series record.

• In the GT1 class, victory by point leaders Jan Magnussen and Johnny O’Connell extended Corvette’s victory string to 17 in a row after winning at Lime Rock.

• Jon Field, Jan Magnussen, Sascha Maassen, Timo Bernhard and Emmanuel Collard are the only drivers in Series history to win with four different race cars or chassis/engine combinations.

• Gil de Ferran, a two-time CART champion and former Indy 500 winner, and teammate Simon Pagenaud will make their third American Le Mans Series start at Mid-Ohio. De Ferran hasn’t raced since a runner-up finish in Champ Car’s 2001 Mid-Ohio race, and he is a two-time pole-sitter there. Pagenaud will make his first start at the circuit.

After a sterling third-place overall finish in their debut at Utah, de Ferran and Pagenaud struggled at Lime Rock to a 14th-place finish with gearbox problems.

As team owner, de Ferran is returning to the competition ranks as a driver after a two-year stint as the Sporting Director for the Honda Formula 1 team from 2005 to 2007. Prior to his Salt Lake City start (May 18), he last competed as a driver in October 2003 at Texas Motor Speedway for Team Penske in the IndyCar Series.

• The Intersport Lola of Clint/Jon Field surprised the prototype field at Salt Lake City by streaking past the factory Audi R10s on the second lap to lead for four laps early in the race, and wound up second in LMP1 podium ceremonies. At Lime Rock, the Intersport father-son duo with the help of Richard Berry, delivered another second place podium run and have climbed into a solid second place in driver points.

• Corvette Racing’s Jan Magnussen is the only driver to have won at least one race in all 10 seasons of the American Le Mans Series. Penske Porsche veteran Sascha Maassen and Corvette’s Johnny O’Connell have won in nine seasons.

O’Connell has already won in 2008 but Maassen could climb into a tie with Magnussen with a win at Mid-Ohio. Magnussen stands second in Series history with victories for three different marques. He has won in a Panoz LMP1, a Ferrari 550 Maranello, a Corvette C5.R and C6.R in GT1.

• Timo Bernhard quietly extends his Series all-time consecutive starts string with each start – Lime Rock was his 65th in a row -- a string that began at Sebring in 2002.

• The driver championship point leaders in the four classes of the 2008 American Le Mans Series to date, have virtually rewritten the Series record book with a cumulative total of 477 career starts, 174 career victories, 346 top three (podium) finishes, 69 pole positions, 68 fast laps and 15 Series driving championships.

1. LMP1 Lucas Luhr: 60 starts, 24 wins, 46 top 3s (podium), 16 pole positions, 10 fast laps (Majority as GT2 competitor)

Marco Werner: 47 starts, 21 wins, 40 top 3s, 9 poles, 7 fast laps

Timo Bernhard: 70 starts, 28 wins, 49 top 3s, 13 poles, 18 fast laps

Romain Dumas: 48 starts, 22 wins, 38 top 3s, 15 poles, 12 fast laps

Jan Magnussen: 67 starts, 18 wins, 44 top 3s, 7 pole positions, 8 fast laps

Johnny O’Connell: 89 starts (most all-time), 32 wins, 68 top 3s, 2 poles, 6 fast laps

Jörg Bergmeister: 63 starts, 22 wins, 42 top 3s, 5 poles, 6 fast laps

Wolf Henzler: 33 starts, 4 wins, 19 tops 3s, 2 poles, 1 fast lap.

• Prototype competition in the first four events of the 2008 American Le Mans Series has been torrid. In the Utah Grand Prix (May 18), there were six (6) different overall lead changes involving four different chassis (Audi, Lola, Porsche, Acura) and eight different drivers.

At Long Beach (April 18), five different race cars (4 LMP2, 1 LMP1) representing three (3) different marques / four (4) four different entrants generated five different lead changes among six (6) different drivers in the 100-minute, 71-lap race. The Long Beach race produced a new Series all-time record of nine lead-lap finishers, including seven LMP2 race cars.

The GT2 class has produced similar tight battles between Porsche and Ferrari, led by the Flying Lizard Motorsports team (Porsche) and Tafel Racing (Ferrari). Porsche has won three times in 2008, including the last two races, and leads the manufacturer championship by 13 points over Ferrari.

• A total of 122 drivers have scored Series victories in the 10-year history of the American Le Mans Series to date (1999-2008) and 743 drivers have competed in at least one race.

• Flying Lizard Motorsports recorded its second straight GT2 victory and third of the season by winning at Lime Rock. Jörg Bergmeister and Wolf Henzler have opened an 11-point championship lead over Tafel Racing’s Dirk Mueller and Dominik Farnbacher heading to Mid-Ohio. Bergmeister, Henzler and Marc Lieb opened the season with a victory at Sebring, which saw a 1-2 finish for Flying Lizard. The team achieved the feat again at Salt Lake City with Johannes van Overbeek and Patrick Pilet second in class.

• The Acura Sports Car Challenge marks the sixth American Le Mans Series race featuring ethanol-based cellulosic E85. Corvette Racing, Drayson-Barwell and Intersport Racing each will compete for the full 2008 season on cellulosic E85, which is produced from biomass such as wood waste, switch grass or citrus. Clean, sulfur-free diesel and gasoline-based E10 are two other fuel options, a pioneering effort in alternative energy sources.

In January, the American Le Mans Series announced a partnership with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Department of Energy and SAE International to incorporate "green racing" principles into its 2008 racing season. The Series is the ultimate proving ground for manufacturers to market and promote energy conservation technologies on the race track.

At Petit Le Mans in October, the Series will hold its first Green Challenge event, which will rank cars by the amount of energy used, greenhouse gasses emitted and petroleum displaced over the course of the race.

Awards will be given out to the winning prototype and winning Grand Touring car at Road Atlanta.

- Bob Dickinson -